Of Fathers and Sons
by Namls
Summary: When his wife dies at childbirth Pippin leaves his son with Merry and Estella. Last chapter up!
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note**: At first glance this story might seem similar to another story of mine, "the Eye of the Storm". They share some common themes but reading on you will soon find that they are taken in two completely different directions. I haven't written anything focusing on tragedy before, this is my first try at it. It has been quite difficult to write but I hope it's enjoyable to read.

**Disclaimer**: Characters and places belong to JRR Tolkien and are used without permission. Sorry.

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"Strange how even the worst of days can be sunny", Merry thought as he sat out on the Crickhollow doorstep watching the sun set in a beautiful cascade of pink, orange and purple. The sun had shone bright in the sky all day long over the early June landscape, filled with lovely green trees and flowers still in bloom. A robin was singing a happy song in his tree nearby, nature seemed to have not a care in the world. It had been a splendid day, turned into a splendid evening, and it was the worst day of Pippin's life. Funny how the two could be combined. Merry allowed himself a few more minutes in this haven of life at its best before returning inside to be there for his cousin.

It had all begun nine months ago when Pippin's wife Diamond had found herself to be in a delicate condition. Not much fuss had been made over the discovery, since their wedding in 1427 Diamond had been with child at least once per year. After two and a half years of marriage Diamond had had four miscarriages, and didn't have much faith that this time would be any different. Though as the months passed by the pregnancy progressed unharmed, and when she and Pippin celebrated their 3rd anniversary in March of 1430 she was in her sixth month and convinced that this time she would carry it to term.

After a full nine months pregnancy her labour had begun early in the morning, on this day which had been so beautiful. But things had not gone well for her. Her husband had been kept blissfully unaware of her birth not going as it should, had he known he would not have been so full of joy and excitement as he had been all day long. After a fourteen hour struggle it was over. Diamond was fading into unconsciousness when the child was delivered at six in the afternoon, and closed her eyes for good before ever getting to see the child she had struggled so hard to bring into the world.

It had been Martha, the midwife, who got the heavy burden of telling Pippin that he had a son but no longer a wife. Diamond's mother, who had assisted, could not bring herself to talk to her son-in-law, or to part from her no longer living daughter.

Pippin had been in his study together with Merry, discussing details on a map of Gondor, when Martha had come with the news of the birth. Pippin had been over himself with joy, he had given up hope of ever having a child, and he went straight for his wine carafe which he only brought out at special occasions. When the news of Diamond's passing away was given to him he dropped the carafe on the floor and it shattered into a million peaces, just like his life. Merry had been the one to clean up the mess and pick up the pieces. Now it was time to go inside and do the same with the Hobbit as he had done with the carafe.

He found Pippin in his study, positioned in his favourite armchair, staring into space with eyes red and swollen. Barely two hours had passed since he learned of his wife's demise. It broke Merry's heart to see him in this condition, the pain in Pippin's eyes hurt anyone who cared for him. Merry was sad over the loss of Diamond as well, she had lived in the same house as him for three years and he had come to care a lot for Pippin's wife. But Merry's sadness was not important right now, Pippin needed all the help he could get.

"Martha has gone to find a nurse" Merry told his cousin. "Since Diamond can't feed the… Oh Pippin, I'm so sorry about all this. This was supposed to be the happiest day of your life, and now look at how it ended."

"Diamond's gone…" Pippin said in a softer voice than Merry had ever heard before. It scared Merry to hear it, Pippin's voice had always been a combination of softness and strength. Now there was no trace of the strength.

"My beloved… Diamond with her sparkling smile, her tender touch, her sweet scent… Diamond who always bakes raisin buns on Saturdays and who always wakes me up in the morning by accident when she reaches out her hand to see if I'm still in bed. She's gone."

"I don't know what to say" Merry admitted. "Only that I am here for you."

Pippin didn't say anything. Merry wished there was something he could do to ease the pain for him but he knew there was nothing. Hobbits like Pippin should not be this sad, they were meant to laugh and be cheerful. Pippin had never been truly sad a day in his life, no matter how hard the day had been he had always managed to smile before he went to sleep. But not this day.

"Have you seen the baby?" Merry asked.

Pippin shook his head and tears began to fall down his cheeks again.

"I haven't been able to bring myself to do it quite yet."

Merry bit his lower lip and wished Aragorn was here, Aragorn who had children of his own and who was wise and together and who always seemed to know what to do. Merry didn't have a clue. What could he possibly say or do to make it hurt less for Pippin? Merry thought of his own life, of Estella Bolger whom he would be married to in September. The thought of losing her after only three years made him cringe. He could understand how painful it must be. Fortunately the baby had survived; Pippin could find some comfort in knowing he had a child to remember his wife by, and an heir at that. In the midst of the tragedy something wonderful had happened.

He walked over to his cousin and put his hand on his shoulder. Pippin looked up at him with despair in his eyes. Merry gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

"This too will heal with time" he said. "You will be so much stronger in the end of it."

Pippin put his arms around Merry and drew him close, clinging to him while he shook with sobs. Merry let him cry. Perhaps the pain would little by little wash away with the tears.

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A week later Merry once again found himself standing outside Pippin's study, bracing himself to go in and talk to his cousin. A lot had happened in the past week, a week which had been like a bad dream from the start to finish.

Pippin had stayed away most of the time, barely sticking his nose outside his study. The only time he came out was when he was hungry, which happened alarmingly seldom, and to say goodbye to Diamond before she was taken away. Merry feared for his cousin's well-being, and he was not the only one. Pippin's father had been staying at Crickhollow for the past five days, trying to get through to his son and help him get past this first difficult period, but he was not having much luck. The biggest problem was that Pippin had yet to see his baby. He blankly refused to leave his study to come see the newborn and wouldn't allow the child to be brought to him. His father Paladin had tried for five days to talk him into seeing the child but to no avail. Finally Paladin had turned to Merry.

"You talk to him" he had said. "If anyone can get through to him, its you."

Merry was not so sure about that. He had not been able to be there for Pippin as much as he would have liked during the past days, for his own life had been quite chaotic. His wedding had been moved up, it would be held in just a week, in spite of Merry's loud protests that they weren't ready yet and it was a really bad time. His parents had disagreed, saying that a wedding was just what everyone needed to lift the spirits. Who really felt like going to a wedding so shortly after visiting a funeral, Merry wondered. But he knew that when his father ordered something all he could do was obey.

Now he knocked on the door and stepped inside, finding Pippin curled up in his armchair staring into space, just like he had the week before. A chill crept down Merry's spine, it was uncanny seeing Pippin like this. But he closed the door and took a deep breath. He had to get through to Pippin somehow. He had promised his uncle that much. And Pippin definitely needed it.

"How are you today?" he asked.

"Numb" Pippin said. "You know, it's funny… When the pain is at its worst all you wish for is the numbness to come… and when it does it's even worse, for you know that when the pain returns it hits you even worse."

"So what happens now?" Merry asked. "Where does this all leave you?"

"Alone. I'm alone. Everything went away when she did. Oh Merry, I don't want to live my life without her, I can't!"

"Yes you can. And you will. For you must."

"I heard about your wedding."

"Terrible, isn't it?" Merry said. "Estella and I both want to wait. We don't want to get married now, not so soon after this! How could we possibly?"

"Uncle Saradoc insisted, didn't he?"

"He and your father both. They say that a wedding is what we all need. But we won't be able to rejoice. It's not fair to us and it's not fair to Diamond. But we have no choice, within a week Estella and I will be husband and wife. To tell you the truth it scares me a little."

"I have been thinking about Diamond, and my own wedding" Pippin said. "That was the happiest day of my life. I swear to you my feet were not touching the ground when I heard us pronounced wed, and that first kiss we shared… I thought it was going to last forever. Turns out forever is not all that long."

Merry looked down at his feet, trying to find the words to lead them in to the subject they needed to discuss. Why had Merry been the one selected to talk to Pippin about this? He couldn't think of a single thing to say which his uncle had not already said.

"Uncle Paladin tells me he's been speaking with you a lot" he finally said.

"Indeed he has" Pippin said and rose from his chair. "I am moving back to the Great Smials with him. I thought you should know."

Merry was taken completely by surprise.

"No!" he said. "You can't! You can't leave here! I need to have you here! What are you going to do at the Great Smials?"

"Father thinks I should go there and be with my family" Pippin said, avoiding to look at his cousin. "The Great Smials is where I'm going to be when I'm Thain anyway, I might as well move there now. This place just has too many memories Merry… Everywhere I go I feel her, see her, hear her. This study is the only place I feel safe from her presence. As soon as my father suggested me moving I realised I cannot live here a day longer than absolutely necessary! I can't live in Diamond's halls and sleep in her bed!"

"But you can't run away" Merry said. "You need to face this head on, like you always have faced your troubles."

"It's for the best" Pippin said. "And not just for me, for you as well! You and Estella need some privacy, not to have me around all day long. Being at the Great Smials I'll always be surrounded by people who have time to keep me company all the time. You will have a new wife Merry; you won't have time for us both, not as much time as I need anyway. I can't be around here bringing you down at a time when you're supposed to be joyous."

"Is there anything I can say that will convince you to stay? I love you, I want to have you near, especially now! I don't want to be more than an hour away by pony when you are hurting so bad!"

"I'm going, and that's that."

"It will be so empty when you and the baby leave" Merry said. "Pippin won't you come see him? I have seen him, he's beautiful, he truly is."

"I can't believe how much my life has changed this past week" Pippin said, ignoring Merry's question and sitting back down. "Eight days ago I had the world! Now look at me…"

"Listen to me" Merry said. "Life goes on. Somehow you must find a way to get by without Diamond. No use in wishing things were different, you must accept the way they are and move on. Otherwise you will be lost!"

"Merry everything I thought I would have is gone" Pippin said and began to cry. "You don't know what it's like! I had Diamond and I had a happiness unlike anything I knew I could find. Then we were having a baby and suddenly we would have everything we would ever need. Each other and an heir. I saw myself raising the child together with my wife, being happy. Now my wife is gone, she will never ever be back. And as for the child…"

"The child might never know his mother, but his life is going to be wonderful" Merry said. "He will grow up at the Smials, surrounded by people who love him."

"No he won't" Pippin said. "I can't raise a child by myself. You know that children need to be with their mothers; whenever a child loses its mother we place that child with another lass who can raise him or her. You know this Merry, you've seen it."

"But this is different" Merry said. "He won't lack a lass in his life; he has your mother and your sisters!"

"That's not enough. This is no different than any other situation where a child loses its mother."

"It is different, in a very important way" Merry said. "The Thain, just like the Master, places children without mothers in new families, with those who cannot have children of their own. Your child is The Took's second heir; he cannot be raised by some random family! He needs a proper upbringing."

"He can't be raised with me" Pippin said. "I'm giving him to you."

Merry just gaped and stared at his cousin for a moment, unsure whether he had heard him correctly or not.

"What did you just say?"

Pippin looked at him with a firm look in his eyes and spoke sternly, with no trace of the sobs which he had spoken with just moments ago.

"I am giving him to you. You will raise my child. I can't so you will. You will be married shortly; it is the ideal solution, both a female and a male to raise the child."

"No Pippin, you cannot give me that baby!" Merry objected, scared out of his mind. "First of all he doesn't belong with me! Second, I have not yet brought Estella home as my wife! I need to be with her, you said it yourself, we need time to one another! If I don't have time for you how do you expect me to have time for a **baby**?"

"You will find a way. Can you really deny me something so big? The baby would be raised by the future Master of Buckland, that is as good as being raised by the future Thain of Tuckburough; you won't be teaching your own son anything that this child doesn't need to be taught! I am asking you, Merry! Consider it a wedding gift."

"**No**, Peregrin! It is not fair of you to ask this of me! And without even consulting Estella!"

"There is no other way. It's for the best. You can't talk me out of this, my mind's made up."

"It's too big of a responsibility! I can't be the one to make all important choices for your child! Take care of him yourself! I don't even know the baby's name, how can I be his guardian?"

"Oh name the kid whatever you want, Merry I need you to do this for me! Someone has to take that child and you should be the one to do it!"

"I refuse" Merry said and shook his head firmly. "I won't do it."

"Talk to Estella first, won't you do that at least?"

"You won't even look at the baby and you're asking me to raise it?"

"Merry talk to her! Talk to her, or better yet let me do it. The baby has no mother Meriadoc, he needs someone to raise him! That nurse Martha got him can't be there forever!"

"Yes she can, she can care for him at the Great Smials, where the baby's father is."

"They won't allow that in the long run and you know it" Pippin said. "How can you deny me this? You said you would always be there for me, no matter what!"

"I was thinking something more along the lines of offering a shoulder to cry on."

"I have shoulders to cry on. I need someone to take that child. **Please**!"

"I'll tell you what… I will talk to Estella, although I guarantee you that she will say no, but only if you come and look at your son."

"I can't, don't ask me to" Pippin said and broke away from Merry's glare.

"Yes you can. If I can ask my fiancée to take a baby in and raise it then you can bloody well come look at the baby when it is yours by blood! Do not demand things of me and try to slither your way out of something which nobody can even understand why you're refusing to do!"

"I just can't!" Pippin cried and began to sob hysterically. "I cannot bring myself to look at the being that cost Diamond her life!"

Merry was once again lost for words to say. The hardest part was that he knew Pippin might be right. No other fathers got to keep their children if the mother died, why should Pippin be any different? And it hurt to think that Pippin's baby would be raised by regular Hobbits who didn't have a clue of what a Thain needed to know. Pippin's son should not be raised without all the privileges that were his birthright.

"I will talk to Estella" he said. "But just promise me you will think about this."

"He will have a good life with you" Pippin said. "I have nothing to offer him. You have everything to offer him."

"I don't have his father" Merry said and felt the weight of the world on his shoulders.

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"You wished to see me?" Estella said and entered Merry's study tentatively.

"Yes, come in" Merry said and rubbed his temples with a sigh. How was he going to be able to ask her this?

"You know you're not supposed to se me the week before our wedding, what is so important?" she asked, and he could tell she was nervous.

"Come here, sit on the couch" Merry said.

He walked over to the couch and sat down right next to her, taking his hands in his. Her hands were so small in his unusually large hand it could almost disappear. These hands would hold his children by their tiny hands, stroke their hair, sew them clothes and cook them meals. These hands would nurture them through life. But what about a child which was not their own?

Estella looked at him with wide eyes, frightened by his silence and his demand to see her at times when they were required by tradition to be apart. Their wedding had been moved up by three months, it had been a hard time for her to adjust, and now this. She could not think of a single positive reason why he would ask to speak with her. Nothing positive could be so important that he couldn't tell her by message.

"Merry I love you" she said. "You… you feel the same, do you not?"

"I love you insatiably" Merry assured her. "But now I need to ask something of you which will be hard to accept. Something we need to talk about. Something that was not part of any deal and I am eternally sorry I ever had to have this conversation with you."

He looked into her eyes and saw how scared she was. He was scared too.

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A week later Meriadoc Brandybuck was wed to Estella Bolger. Pippin attended the wedding, for his cousin's sake alone. The party was not the joyous occasion it should have been, but thanks to the amazing Hobbit ability to shake any sorrow before long spirits were much higher than they would have been among humans in such a situation.

While the wedding ceremony took place workers from the Great Smials moved all of Young Master Pippin's possessions from Buckland to Tuckburough. All save for the baby. He was to stay with Merry and Estella, under their care from now on. The nurse Martha had found, a lass who had just lost her own infant baby, was to stay for as long as the child needed it. No name had been given to the baby. When Merry had asked Pippin what to name his son Pippin had just shrugged his shoulders and said he didn't care. Merry had tried for over an hour to convince Pippin to change his mind, and assured him that one day Pippin would take his son back. Either if he remarried or when he realised he could take care of the child at the Smials. Pippin didn't want to hear it. He had made up his mind.

Merry was convinced that Pippin would come around sooner rather than later. Once the first thick fogs of sorrow had lifted he would demand to see his son, long for the little being which was not only a part of him but a part of the wife he had lost. Until that day Merry had agreed to provide a roof over the child's head, but he hoped it would not be for long. He and Estella wanted children of their own. His parents had been very upset when they heard of the arrangement, and reminded him that with an infant in the house there was not much chance of him and Estella even finding the time to start a family of their own. But when Estella had given her consent Merry had told Pippin okay. It was the hardest decision he had ever had to make, but he had made it and he was going to stick by it.

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The first morning of Merry's married life did not begin as he had thought it would. He had pictured himself waking up in the morning together with Estella, spending all morning in bed with her, talking and enjoying each other's company. He had thought he would get a proper sleep in the night after his wedding and a soft start at his new life.

Three o'clock in the morning, just two hours after he had gone to sleep, he was woken up by a baby screaming in the next room. The baby had been moved from his nursery to the room which Merry and Estella planned on using as a nursery for their own kids, and they could hear him through the wall.

Estella buried her face in Merry's chest, trying to shut out the noise. Merry groaned and wondered if he'd known what he was getting himself into.

"Where's that bloody nurse?" he mumbled. "**Nurse**!"

But no one came to soothe the baby. Merry couldn't take the wait, he angrily jumped out of bed and grabbed his robe. There was nothing he could do if the child needed to be fed, or worse, changed, but he could not stand listening to this any longer. He would pick the baby up and go find that blasted nurse. What good was she really anyway?

The baby was furious by the time he got to the crib, screaming at the top of his lungs. Merry cooed gently and lifted him up into his arms. He was amazed by how heavy the infant was. Pippin's son was certainly not malnourished, oddly enough considering how long it took for his nurse to hear him.

"There, there" Merry said and gently bounced the baby.

The child stopped crying once he was being held and Merry couldn't believe his ears. He breathed in the lovely smell of a newborn child and chuckled.

"Were you just sick for some company?" he asked the baby. "Like father like son, huh? Oh look at you, you little lovely thing… One look at you and your Pa will beg to get to take care of you. Yes he will!"

He sat down in the rocking chair and held the child close. The baby seemed content being in his arms and Merry gently rocked back and forth while looking at the child. He found himself falling in love with this little being, this adorable baby Hobbit with little curls on his feet but none on his head yet. Merry had cared deeply for the baby right from the first moment he saw him, he had always known he would love Pippin's children, and right now he had to admit it was nice getting to take care of him. His situation was in truth difficult, he wanted to be around the baby but most of all he wanted Pippin to be around it. If only Pippin would move back to Crickhollow, then Merry could have it both ways. But he knew better than to hope for such a happening.

"Your father won't be here to see you in a while" he said to the child. "He needs to grieve your mother first. He doesn't understand that you can make the most of his pain go away. I wish I can one day have a child as wonderful as you. I am your Uncle Merry, and until further notice I will take care of you. You need someone to love you, child. Someone to look after you. I promise, I will offer you protection from all that surrounds you. Nothing and no one is going to be able to hurt you."

The child blew a few bubbles of spit and Merry smiled at him. When he wasn't screaming this little thing was absolutely adorable. The baby waved his legs about and Merry gently shushed him. It felt good holding him in his arms. He felt privileged. The baby grabbed his finger and held it tight.

"We can't keep calling you Baby, we need to find a name for you…" he said. "I wanted your father to do it but we can't wait that long."

He paused and looked at the child. It was beginning already. Merry was beginning to make important parenting decisions for his cousin. It hurt Merry more than words could say, for he would have his own children to do this with some day, this was Pippin's only chance and he didn't take it. But the baby needed a name, and Pippin had twice refused to give him one, telling Merry to name the child whatever he wanted to name it.

"I shall call you Faramir" Merry said. "After someone your father loves. He will love that name, it is the right choice. Little Faramir Took… the loveliest baby I have ever seen! You do indeed need someone to love you, and I shall do just that. I shall love you just as much as I love Peregrin. I will love you as much as your parents loved each other."

He held the baby close and kissed the little bald head. He felt like crying with sorrow and crying with joy at the same time. He would be there for Faramir until Pippin could.

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A loud cry woke Merry and Estella up in the middle of the night. Estella motioned to get up but Merry gently pushed her back down.

"Stay, get your rest" he said and kissed her on the ear. "I will go this time. You stay here and care about our own child."

He caressed her swelling belly with his hand as he got up and pulled his robe around him. Estella watched him leave the room then closed her eyes again, placing a hand on her belly. She had a baby in there, a baby who would see the light of day a year after their wedding. Merry was so proud he could burst but they both knew it would be difficult with two babies at the same time.

Estella could hear Merry soothe young Faramir in the other room. She caressed her belly where a new little life was growing. Their own child, as Merry said.

"Merry, dear fool…" she mumbled. "That is our own child in there as well. Peregrin is not going to come for him."

Faramir was now seven months old, and had yet to meet his father. Pippin had not yet managed to go back to Crickhollow since Diamond's death, it was too painful for him. Merry and Estella took care of Faramir, with the help of the nurse who would stay either until Estella had milk to feed him or they decided to wean him. The nurse fed the baby, but refused to do anything more, for she didn't want to get attached. She knew she would not have more than a year with Faramir. Estella secretly felt the nurse was a clever lass, she and Merry might not have much time left with him either. Pippin could decide he wanted the baby back at any time. They shouldn't get attached to him, but Estella could not help it anymore than Merry could. They loved little Faramir, he was such a charming child. Reason told Estella they should be around him as little as possible to spare their hearts the pain of having to part with him, but they both wanted to give the baby all the love his parents could not. Neither of them really minded the screaming, the changing of the nappies or being covered in spit up at least once a day. Faramir was a precious child and they loved him.

She could hear Faramir screaming still, then the screams faded and she realised Merry had taken him to the nurse to be fed. It annoyed Estella that they had to bring the baby to the nurse, the nurse ought to go to Faramir whenever he cried to see if he was hungry. Estella would never let her own baby wait for so long to be fed, she wished she could feed Faramir but she knew that she could not, at least not yet. She longed for the day she could fire that cranky nurse, she would have to look into what the youngest age was for a child to be weaned.

Merry came back quite some time later, surprised to find her awake. He hung his robe up on a nail on the wall and crawled into bed, placing a hand on Estella's pregnant belly. The child was due in 22 weeks, Merry wished it could be here already.

"You should get your sleep" he said and gave Estella a kiss on the cheek.

"Merry…" she said. "What are we going to do when Peregrin wants Faramir back?"

"We are going to be happy" Merry said. "For it is what's best for Faramir as well as for Peregrin. Poor Pippin, he's so terribly sad! If only he would take one glance at his son and realise that he has a lot left to live for. If I lost you at childbirth I would consider myself blessed to have a child to remember you by!"

"I love Faramir" Estella said. "It will hurt to let him go. Merry I would rather have him leave sooner than later. Before it gets too hard."

"Maybe it's time we paid Daddy Peregrin a visit" Merry said. "If he won't come see Faramir, Faramir shall come see him. We'll go to the Great Smials tomorrow."

"Thank you" Estella said to her husband and kissed him.

"You have been so wonderful through all of this" Merry said. "I cannot deny you anything you ask of me."

"Promise me that we will have a baby just as great as Faramir."

"That we will" Merry said and kissed her. "We will have the only child in the world as good as Faramir."

She crawled up as close to him as she could get and sighed contently. He held his arms around her and made her feel loved and protected. It scared her that Pippin might want Faramir back the very next day, but better tomorrow than a year from today when she had gotten even more attached. She was glad she had a baby of her own on the way, someone to love like she loved the baby now sleeping in the next room.

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Pippin was happy to see Merry the next day. He hugged him tight and didn't let go for several minutes. It was the same thing every time Merry came to the Smials, Pippin never wanted to let him go. Merry had begged him to come live at Crickhollow again, where he could be together with both Merry and his son, but Pippin refused.

"I have a surprise for you, if you ever care to let me go" Merry told his cousin. "There is someone special here to see you."

"Who?"

"Who? Your son, you idiot! Who else?"

Pippin froze and released the hug. He gave Merry an angry look.

"I told you, I can't see him. I don't have the strength and frankly I don't wish to. I thought I had made this perfectly clear! Where is he? Get him out of here!"

"You cannot go on like this forever" Merry said, getting annoyed. "Like it or not there is a baby that you have fathered! You cannot shut him out of your life just because you can't deal with it! That is not what parenting is, Pippin."

"I'm not parenting him, you are."

"Only as a favour to you until you can get your act together. Peregrin I really think that everything you need in the world right now is to hold Faramir in your arms. It's amazing Pip, the love you feel… You will forget your sorrow when you hold him, that I promise you! You will see that Diamond is still alive through Faramir!"

"I **can't**!" Pippin cried. "If I hold him I shall go mad! I want to hold his mother, that is what I want!"

"When you hold him you hold his mother too" Merry said.

"No, I hold the little thing that took her life."

"Are you still going on about that? He's just a baby, Pippin!"

"Look, I just cannot deal with this, not now! Get him out of here!"

"Have it your way then, stay cooped up here all day, Estella is weary and needs to rest before we can leave. And Faramir has a right to see his grandparents and his aunts. They are thrilled that he is here!"

"Do whatever you like then, but leave me out of it" Pippin said. "Nothing you can say is going to change my mind. Not right now. I'm sorry Merry, I can't right now, the wound is still too fresh."

"Don't tell me you're sorry, tell him. Your wound is seven months old by now and the time has come for you to allow the one person into your life who can actually heal you. It is a gift, having that child. Being a father is a gift. He could have died when Diamond did but he didn't. Don't you think she would want you not to miss out on these first precious months?"

"Diamond didn't want any of this" Pippin said and tears began to fall down his cheeks as he spoke. "She cried when she found out she was expectant again. She asked me, she begged me, she made me promise never to put her through it again once this pregnancy ended. She had lost so many babies and she didn't want that pain again! She was miserable, it hurt me so bad seeing her that way. All I ever wanted was to please her, and at that moment I vowed to forget about having a stupid heir, my sister's son can take over after me. All that mattered was her. Now she's gone, and I can't bring myself to look upon that which she grieved so much over and which caused her her very life!"

Merry gave up for now. It was obvious that Pippin had too many demons to fight within himself to be able to love Faramir the way he needed to be loved. He needed more time. There was something the matter with Pippin which made it impossible for him to grieve and move on, but he didn't seem to know what it was himself. Once he figured it out Merry would be there for him, but he prayed it would be sometime soon. Merry made a silent promise to Faramir that he would be in his father's loving arms before his first birthday. Pippin could not set the child aside for any longer than that. Right now he let his cousin weep alone, Pippin wanted his privacy.

Merry went to the sitting room where Faramir was in his aunt Precinct's arms and he was glad to know he would receive a loving home here when the time was right. It would break his heart to give the child up but Faramir would be better off with his closest family.

Faramir smiled at him and put his foot in his mouth. Merry smiled and walked over, lifting him over to his own arms. He kissed the child on the head and again vowed to reunite him with his father before he was one year old. He had promised Pippin to take good care of the child, and the best way Merry knew how to do that was give Faramir his father back.

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**End note**: The basis for this story comes from some research I've been doing in college about family situations in my home country during the past centuries. I found that just a few generations back men were not considered apt to take care of their own children; if the mother was dead the children had to be given to another woman who could raise them. When I was writing "Eye of the Storm" I used death at childbirth to explain the setting and I got intrigued by the thought of what would have happened if Hobbit fathers did not get to raise their children if the mother was missing. Since Pippin only had one child I found it a great opportunity to use the Took characters to explore this storyline, and who better to leave the child with than Merry?

The story will continue on for at least a few chapters more. I hope you will be with me throughout the course of the series! And I would love to hear your opinions of the story, especially since this is my first attempt at writing anything which can be considered angst. There is always room for improvement, help me find out how!


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note**: The second chapter pretty much speaks for itself; I don't have anything to comment about it. Thanks to those of you who reviewed the first chapter, your comments were very kind )

**Disclaimer**: Well, same as for the last chapter…

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Pippin squinted at the bright sun and thought he should have left his cape at home. It was far too warm to wear a cape, May was giving way to June and summer was already upon them. But wearing a cape felt comforting, it brought a sense of security. Maybe that was why he wore his cape even in the hottest days of July and September.

Merry walked next to him, sporting a grim look and wearing his cape as well. Neither of them had said much, but they usually didn't need to. Four decades of friendship had taught them how to socialise with each other without using words. Pippin was glad just to have the company. The past year had been the loneliest of his life, with Diamond gone and himself moving away from Merry. He was glad Merry had come to visit him at the Great Smials.

"It's going to be a hotter year than the last" Pippin remarked and kicked at some leaves on the ground left over from last fall.

"Perhaps."

"Whoever rakes these paths?" Pippin wondered. "There should be no brown leaves cluttering up the paths. Remember when we were little and we used to jump around in the huge piles of leaves the gardeners raked up? How angry they were with us…"

"I don't feel like small talk" Merry said. "I'm not in the mood for small talk."

"Fine then… What do you want to talk about?"

"Will you come see him?"

Pippin stopped for a second, then continued walking. It was almost one year to the date since his wife had passed away, and Pippin had yet to see his son.

"Merry I don't think that I--"

"It's his first birthday. You should be there for that. His father ought to be there."

"I have plans that day."

"Plans? You have plans? Your only child is celebrating his only first birthday ever and you have plans? What kind of plans, might I ask? Locking yourself in your room and digging an ever deeper pit of pity for you to hide in, I bet."

"Who are you to pass out judgment?" Pippin asked. "No, that's not what I will be doing. But if you're going to be that way about it then I won't tell you."

Merry shook his head. He was more disappointed with his cousin than he could express. Faramir would be one year old and he had never gotten to meet his father. Pippin's refusal was getting ridiculous. Merry understood how much it must hurt him to have lost Diamond, but no Hobbit could mourn forever. At least so Merry had thought. Pippin seemed to have fallen down a hole and had no desire even to get out of it.

"It would mean the world to him, you know" Merry said. "I tell him about you all the time. His father. How he will come for him when the time is right. I promised him you would come see him before he was one year of age."

"Since when did you make promises you can't keep, you're too responsible for that."

"Please don't make me a breaker of promises now."

"It's a whole lot to ask Merry."

"No it's not, you twit!" Merry exclaimed. "It's not a lot to ask that you see your own son for the first time, sooner or later it has to happen and all the other fathers out there see their babies on the day they are born! Don't come talk to me about 'a lot to ask', you asked me to **raise** the baby! I took the tot in for you, you can come see him for me."

"No I can't" Pippin said. "I gave him to you for a reason."

"Surely you do not mean you won't ever come see him" Merry said. "Why would you have given him to your very best friend whom you see all the time if you never planned on looking at the child! I think you're scared, and I think you're acting pathetic. It stopped being about you the moment he was born, you know that, you can't hide behind being afraid anymore."

"A lone father cannot raise a child so I gave him to you" Pippin reminded his cousin. "Don't say I never did anything for him! I gave him the best home possible, didn't I?"

"No, you didn't. He should be with you."

"He **can't** bloody be with me, you know this Merry! And it's not that I'm afraid! But five days from today will be one year to the date since I was robbed of my wife. That is not the time to reunite me with that child."

"How would you have felt if your father wouldn't come see you even on your birthday?" Merry asked.

"That is different. His situation was different. He had Mother."

"On his birthday little Faramir can at least have his father."

"Stop pestering me" Pippin said. "I gave him up, and that's just that."

Merry wanted to grab his cousin by the shoulders and shake him hard until whatever parts were loose in Pippin's head fell into place. But what use would it be? Somehow he could not reach Pippin the way he used to be able to. It kept Merry awake at night knowing that whatever Diamond had taken with her when she died it seemed to be something which Pippin needed to get back on his feet. It should not take a Hobbit this long to get back on track no matter what he had lost. Merry wanted so bad to get through to Pippin and make him understand that if he just let Faramir into his life he would bounce back from the loss of Diamond so much sooner. But he couldn't reach his cousin.

Pippin bit his upper lip and looked away. He felt scared to meet his cousin's glare. He wanted his old best friend back, the one who would have sat him down under a tree, held his hands and just talked and talked and talked until Pippin finally opened up and spilled out everything that he didn't even know he needed to put into words. But either Merry had forgotten how to do that or he just didn't have the time anymore. Pippin missed the old gentle, caring Merry so much that he could scream. His cousin was not half as gentle and caring as he once had been, he only came with harsh words that Pippin needed to pull himself together and above all be a father. Did he not think he got to hear that enough as it was? Pippin could feel a distance between himself and his cousin which had never been there before. Perhaps moving out of Crickhollow had been a mistake. But it was the only thing Pippin had known to do at the time.

Part of Pippin wished he could reach out his hand and take Merry's. He wished he could be young and small again and that his cousin could hold him close and soothe him the way he had used to. Merry had promised he would offer a shoulder to cry on whenever it was needed but who wanted to lean against a shoulder which demanded you pull yourself together at once?

Merry gave up trying to get eye contact with Pippin and angrily gave the leaves a kick. He wished his best friend would just grow up and act responsible. Running and hiding had never been Pippin's style, it didn't suit him one little bit. Merry wished there was a magic spell he could say that would make it all okay again. But there was none and right now he felt he could not devote his efforts to helping Pippin get over his loss. That would have been his number one priority in the world, but things were not the way they ought to have been. Waiting for him at home was not only his wife but a little boy whom Merry had been entrusted with. They were dealing with a little lad's whole life and Merry could not set that aside just to hold Pippin's hand. Pippin's complete lack of affection and longing for his baby made Merry more upset than words could say.

"Come" he said. "Come see him on his birthday. I beg of you, please."

Pippin looked at him with sad eyes and shook his head. No, he could not do it. He saw Merry's jaw clench but then the look of anger changed and turned into a look of sadness.

"Do you know what day I dread, more than anything has ever frightened me before my whole life?" he asked Pippin.

"The day Estella gives birth?" Pippin asked. Merry's wife was only weeks away from having a baby.

"No" Merry said, shaking his head. "The day I have to look that boy in the eyes and answer him when he asks me why his own father does not love him."

Pippin felt he could not walk another step. He didn't know if the feeling that came over him was that of guilt, fear, anger or some whole other thing. All he knew was that he felt like he had just fallen through thin ice into icing cold water. Merry strode on, refusing to hear the whimpers that past over Pippin' lips.

"You stay here and kick at your leaves" Merry said angrily. "I have a baby to return to."

"Merry please don't walk away, I need you!"

"So does that child you brought into the world" Merry said without turning to look at his best friend. "And he comes first."

Pippin watched Merry stride away and felt like his heart was breaking all over again. Heavy sobs started running like thrusts through him and he lifted his hand up to cover his mouth, both wanting Merry to hear it and fearing that if he did he still wouldn't turn around. He sunk down on the ground and sobbed without making a sound for several minutes, feeling like he could barely breathe through the pain.

"Oh Diamond…" he whimpered. "There is only pain without you, I want you back alive… Please Diamond, wherever you are, please tell me you can still see me and that you are watching. Please help me keep Merry, hold him still in my life. If he walks out on me too then everything is lost. I know I have let you down so badly but help me keep my best friend or I don't know what to do anymore. Diamond help me and make this pain go away…"

All alone out on the path he sat until the fierce sobs had ceased. He shivered and pulled his cape around him, thankful now that he had it. He stayed on the path for a long time, unable to get up.

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Pippin swallowed nervously and knocked on the door, which was already open. Merry took his eyes off the baby he was holding and motioned with his head that Pippin should come inside. With a smile Pippin came in and sat down opposite Merry.

"I know we haven't talked since that day out on the path…" he said. "But I got the news and I wanted to come congratulate you. A daughter, Father tells me. And both Estella and the child are doing wonderfully."

"Yes, a daughter" Merry said. "Born at dawn on June 27th, so that's her name."

"June 27th? Odd name for a Hobbit, but I guess that can work" Pippin joked.

"Father was a bit disappointed that I didn't have a son" Merry said. "But there is time for that later on."

"Though a son would have been more comforting, wouldn't it?" Pippin said. "Not having to try again, already having an heir… Not that there's anything wrong with having a daughter! She's lovely, Merry!"

"Yes she is" the proud father said and smiled at the baby.

"I had to come when I got the news" Pippin said. "All quarrels aside, I had to be here and see your child, Father Meriadoc."

Merry gave him an odd look.

"What?" Pippin asked. "Is there something wrong?"

"No… Just that you felt you had to be here to see my child, yet you have not laid eyes upon your own baby yet. Really Pippin, not that I don't appreciate you being here to see her, but don't you think it's rather peculiar?"

"Perhaps a tad" Pippin admitted. "But I wasn't going to let whatever issues I have concerning that child to affect my relationship with you or your children."

"You know, perhaps you shouldn't have come."

"You don't mean that."

"I don't see how you can come for my daughter but not for your son. It makes me feel uncomfortable, it's just plain wrong!"

"We will not have this discussion Merry, we really will not" Pippin said. "Why don't you leave my relationship with my child up to me and worry about something that is your business."

"Problem is you **have** no relationship with your son" Merry said. "And are you kidding me? This very much **is** my business, you entrusted the child to me! You told me to provide for his well-being, but I am not supposed to care whether or not he gets to know his dad?"

"Get off my case" Pippin snarled. "I didn't entrust him to you to have you chew me out over this every time we meet. Can we for once have a conversation which doesn't end up around the child? I am here to congratulate you on the birth of your own, can we please just leave it at that?"

"Peregrin…" Merry said in a softer tone. "What do you think Faramir will feel when he finds out you saw his second cousin, born more than a year after him, before you saw him? It's going to break his heart, you will hurt him very much if you keep this up. Doesn't that matter to you? I look at this child in my arms and Pippin you would never believe the love! There is no other love like the one you have for your child, as someone who has always loved with all your heart you should be one to appreciate that! I have never known you to turn your back on any kind of love, and this is the most natural love you can feel. Peregrin I cannot for the life of me understand how a parent can avoid feeling love for their child! How they can make sure that they don't! I just don't understand you."

"You don't understand me, that's just wonderful" Pippin sighed. "You've always understood me in the past."

"This time I need you to help me" Merry said.

"I'm unable to explain how I feel" Pippin said. "That is where I need you to step in, when have I ever had to explain how I feel to you? You've always known anyway! I thought you would be the one person to understand this, to understand me."

"Honestly Pip, I think you don't understand it either" Merry said. "If you truly believe that I can understand you no matter what then the only explanation is that you don't comprehend the way you feel yourself. How can I understand what you yourself cannot?"

"You always have, you've always understood me better than I understand myself."

"Go hold your boy" Merry said. "Or just look at him at least. What harm can it do to get to know him? He is a year old now and beginning to turn into a little person. He has a favourite lullaby, 'Like a Flower on a Meadow'. He has a security blanket Estella gave him for her birthday, he carries it around everywhere. He is walking Pip, he's only a year old but he's walking. And you know what else? He loves raisin buns."

"Stop it!" Pippin spat out. "I don't want to hear it, why are you doing this?"

"Because you are my best friend in the whole world. And you're sinking."

"Maybe you can save the world Merry, but there are some things you cannot do. One of them is helping me through this ordeal by passing out judgment."

"I never thought I'd say this but there are more important things than helping you through the loss of your wife. Faramir is more important. Diamond is dead Peregrin, she is never coming back, not ever. Faramir is alive, he has his entire life ahead of him. What's best for him is my biggest concern, you made it so. I can't drop him and go hold your hand, if I can only care for one of you then it has to be him right now."

"You keep telling me that I need to pull myself together and be that child's father, but if you truly believed that you would do everything in your power to help me. I cannot be anything at all to that child until I get over losing her and I cannot do that. How can I get through the darkest time of my life when you, the one person I need, the one who has always understood me and loved me no matter what crazy things I've done, when you won't be there for me? I can't cross a river without a bridge, Meriadoc."

"I am not that bridge. Faramir is."

"He's a baby" Pippin said. "The baby that caused my wife to bleed to death. That is not a bridge, it is a boat with a huge leak in it, which would take me to the bottom of the river!"

"Are you really blaming him?"

"Stop condescending me!"

"What has gotten into you?" Merry asked. "You're not the Peregrin I grew up with. Nor the one I journeyed with and nearly lost my life with."

"That's right, I'm not. That Peregrin died the day she did. The day that child came into the world. He might have been born but Diamond died and so did I."

"No you just like to pity yourself, for whatever reason."

Pippin flew to his feet and looked at his cousin with aversion. Merry shifted his eyes and looked down on his child, taking some strength in the sight of her. He didn't like getting into these fights with Pippin all the time, he wished things could be back the way they always had been.

"If you don't want to be my friend and help me through this, fine" Pippin said with spite. "You've proven your loyalty to me, the child is in your care. Don't feel obliged to do anything else, you can stay here at Crickhollow with your own little worries and know that you needn't feel guilty for not seeing me through this. I do have other friends, perhaps its time I tried to make them understand me."

Merry watched him leave without a word. He hated parting with Pippin on bad terms, especially two times in a row, but there was not much he could do about it right now. The baby had gone to sleep and he didn't want to wake her by yelling after Pippin. He rose and went to the nursery where he gently laid her down in her crib.

In the crib in the other end of the room a one year old lad was taking a nap. Merry walked up to him and wished things could be different. It would be painful to see little Faramir go but it was even more painful to be caught in this situation. He grabbed the sides of the crib and squeezed them tight, wishing he could scream at the top of his lungs.

"Merry?" he heard Estella's voice from behind him. "Darling is there something the matter?"

She walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. Merry looked at her and then at the peacefully sleeping child.

"What is wrong with my cousin?" he asked. "Why won't he love his son? He came to see my daughter and he has yet to see his own son! That is not normal, frankly it makes me sick to my stomach. What has this precious boy done to deserve this treatment from the one person who ought to love him the most? Just one look Estella, and Pip would feel differently!"

"Maybe that's why he won't see him" Estella said gently. "I think Peregrin is frightened that he will love the baby, and have to watch the child he loves grow up in someone else's home. Say whatever you like Merry but we both know Pippin can in fact not raise this child on his own. His mother is old, she might pass on any year now, and two of his sisters have moved out of the Smials to live with their husbands elsewhere. Now the third is getting married and she might move as well. Pippin is not a stupid lad, he knows this. I think he's afraid he might love his son if he sees him and he is afraid of the pain that would come with it."

"Even if that's so…" Merry said. "I don't think it's about what he wants. It's about what's best for the child. And never knowing your father's love when your father is within your reach can never be good."

"I think Pippin really did give him to you for good" Estella said. "To raise at least. I don't think he will ever choose to play an active part in Faramir's upbringing. You just have to accept that and teach Faramir that his father loves him even though he's not with him. Sometimes the gift of love is staying away."

Merry bit his lower lip and released his firm grip of the crib. He couldn't quite agree with Estella, he didn't like that she made excuses for Pippin, but at the time being there was nothing to be done. Merry thanked his lucky star that the little child in the crib didn't yet know any of the circus surrounding him.

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The tune changed into a different dance and Pippin could see Merry reach his hand out for Estella, who took it and danced into her husband's arms. Together the two showed off their excellent dancing skills in a dance which was not slow yet it was seductive. Their love of dancing was how they had first fallen in love, apparently you could not dance these kind of dances underneath the moonlight for too long without love finding its way into the picture.

Pippin enjoyed the scene from his table. He had never been as skilled at dancing as his cousin, but he had always loved watching Merry dance. There was an elegance to it which Pippin had always wished he could master, unfortunately he looked horribly clumsy whenever he gave it a go. His sister Pearl complained he had been born with two left feet and was impossible to teach a dance to.

Another month had passed since the last time Pippin and Merry had spoken. Pippin could feel he was stomping at the same spot over and over, never managing to take a single step forward, but at the time he accepted it. Too much had happened, he thought that if maybe he stayed where he was for a while then eventually he would force himself to move further, and maybe that was the best way to go about it. Forget about relying on Merry and his other friends, get himself out of the rut.

Yet he could not deny that he missed his best friend. He almost felt like a spy watching Merry and Estella dance, but a glimpse of his cousin enjoying life made him feel good. It was good that they took the opportunity to dance, it probably would not be long before Estella had to sit through all the dances again. Their baby daughter was lovely and healthy, had Pippin been in their shoes he would have wanted to be happy with that situation and call it final, but there was a need for an heir to the future Master of Buckland. The whole thought made Pippin sick. All his life his ears had been filled with the importance of having an heir, he had never understood the point of having children for the sole purpose of hoping it would be a son to carry the bloodline on. He rather wouldn't have children at all then have them strictly for that purpose. But he had done what had been expected of him, against his better judgment he had strived to bring that heir into the world, and now look where it had gotten him. He didn't know who he was more angry with, his father for putting the pressure on him or himself for giving into it.

He watched the happy couple dancing and felt a stab of jealousy. He should have been like them, he should have had Diamond by his side, raising a child together with her. Or if not else, just having her right there beside him for the rest of his life. That was the vow they had given one another, to stay by each other's side for as long as their lives endured. This had not been part of the bargain. His father had spoken to him a lot over the past month about getting remarried, Pippin brushed aside the idea without as much as giving it a thought. He had sworn to love only Diamond for the rest of his life and he was not about to break that promise.

He got up from his seat and hurried out into the nearby woods, away from the party. The pain came over him again, sharp and merciless. Some days he felt fine, he could almost forget he was in mourning, then it all came back and he felt worse than before. He hated himself for allowing to forget about her for hours at a time, yet he knew it was what he had to do in order to survive.

He walked around the woods for well over an hour, trying to walk away from the pain, in the end realising it could not be done. He had never felt so lonely in all his life, and he couldn't help but feel resentment towards the fifteen month old child sleeping in a crib at Crickhollow. Not only had Pippin been robbed of his wife but now Merry as well. He wanted Merry to care for the child, but not toss Pippin aside in the process.

"I never thought I would end up losing you" he said to Merry, or the night, or the trees, or whoever was willing to listen. "But I traded you myself, I traded your friendship for having someone raise the child, and now I can't take it back."

He leaned against the trunk of a tree and wallowed in self-pity. He knew he had to get a hold of himself, he could not continue on like this, it was getting pathetic. But he couldn't do it tonight, it would have to wait until the morning. Right now he was too small and too alone to do anything other than lean his forehead against the tree trunk and let the tears wash his cheeks.

He didn't know it, but he had walked in a circle during his stroll through the woods and now he was right by the party. That's where Merry found him a short while later. Merry strode right up to his cousin, pried his grip from the tree and made Pippin cling to him instead. Merry gently stroke his hair and shushed him like he had Pippin's son during the past year.

"I said I could see you're sinking…" he said. "And I am coming for you. Didn't I promise you I always would?"

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Part three will be up within a near future. I would love any comments on the story! Thanks for reading )


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's note**: This will be my last update in a while; I'm going on a trip. Which will be nice, but I'll miss my computer. How sad is that? Anyways, this chapter begins in early 1433, the year after Merry became Master of Buckland. And I think that's all you need to know…

**Disclaimer**: You know the drill…

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Merry frowned deeply and scratched his chin, observing the problem in front of him. He had to think hard before he did anything, once he made his move there would be no turning back, and a wrong turn could be fatal. He glanced at Pippin and then took a deep breath and made his move.

"There" he said. "Your turn."

Without giving it as much as a thought Pippin grabbed one of his markers and moved it across the board in front of them.

"Your move."

Merry scratched his chin once more and eyed Pippin's draw while his cousin leaned back in his chair and sighed with boredom. It was hopeless trying to play board games with Merry. He put so much thought into it you could fall asleep waiting for him to make his move.

"You sigh, young Took" Merry said. "But you will be sorry later."

He made his next move. Pippin leaned over the board, moved another piece and rose from his chair.

"Cornered."

"What?" Merry eyed the board with shocked eyes. "That can't be possible! How the… Oh drats, you won again!"

"When you said I'll be sorry later I take it you mean I'll be sorry sometime when I'm sixty and you finally beat me" Pippin teased.

"Oh be quiet" Merry said, but he couldn't keep a smile off his face.

"I never would have guessed the Master of Buckland would have so much time on his hands to be beaten in Corners" Pippin said and jumped up on Merry's desk. He picked up a random object. "What do you use this for? It looks funny."

"Put that back" Merry said. "My word, you're worse than… than the children."

"Speaking of which, do you think it will be a boy this time?"

"I don't know" Merry said and shrugged his shoulders. Estella was expecting their third child this summer. "After two daughters it would be nice with a son. I'm reworking my schedule so that I'll have more time with my family, if I keep going at this rate I won't have any time with them at all!"

"No I can see that, all this game playing really takes it out of you."

Merry made a face at his cousin who grinned and started juggling around the unidentified object he had picked up from the desk.

"Be careful with that!" Merry said. "You know, it's taken me a full year as Master of the Hall to get everything working smoothly. I think I've earned a little fun along the way. You ought to watch and learn little cousin, I heard Uncle Paladin is ill again."

"I'm not worried" Pippin said and put the object back down. "If Father can survive that bad injury he had last year I'm sure he will outlive us all. A little fever isn't going to bring him down."

There was a knock on the door and Merry nodded at Pippin to get down from the desk. The Brandybuck nurse, who took care of the children when Merry and Estella were busy, came in and curtsied quickly.

"Sorry to bother you, Master Meriadoc" she said. "Young Master Faramir has fallen and scraped his knee, he is crying and asking for you. Madam Estella is with the baby, I thought I should come to you."

"Of course, Bead" Merry said and got up. "Pip, you will have to excuse me."

Pippin shrugged his shoulders and gave Merry a little wave as his cousin left. Merry followed the nurse to Faramir, who had gotten a little bruise and a scrape on his knee. It was nothing serious, and a little kiss on the knee and Merry's special "Hurt Go Away" song made everything better. Before long Merry had sent the boy back out to play, supervised by Bead, and returned to his study where Pippin was busy resetting the board for another round.

"It was just a little scrape" Merry told Pippin, in case his cousin was concerned. "Nothing bad. He is back outside again."

"Swell" Pippin said. "Fancy another round?"

"No thanks, not today" Merry said. "I really should get back to work. I have a meeting in an hour with the stable staff, I had best be prepared."

"Oh" Pippin said, sounding disappointed. "Well I guess I should get out of your hair then."

"Come visit more often, Pippin" Merry said and sat down by his desk. "Estella and I would love to have you over for dinner, you haven't dined with us once since… since forever it seems. And Faramir would love to see you."

"He would not" Pippin said. "He's not even three, he doesn't know what he wants. But yes, we should have dinner sometime. Why don't you come over to the Smials next week, I know Father would be pleased!"

"Me coming to the Smials?" Merry said and sighed. "Sure. Fine."

"Is there a problem?"

"No, not at all" Merry said and grabbed a pen to start going over his notes for the meeting. "Listen Pip, I will stop by later this week and we'll set a date and time for dinner. Right now I have work to do. Good to see you again! I will beat you next time!"

"That's the spirit Merry, keep dreaming" Pippin said. "Bye for now."

Merry waved at his cousin with one hand as he left but kept his eyes on his document. He tried to concentrate but it was hard. He kept wondering if Pippin had been worried just now when he heard that Faramir had fallen and hurt himself. Children fell and scraped their knees all the time, it was nothing that concerned Merry, but he knew that it often scared parents at first, before they realised it did happen a lot. Pippin had no experience in the area and would be likely to get worried. Merry hadn't been able to detect it though, but who knew how good Pippin was at hiding his emotions? He had never tried earlier in his life, so no one really knew whether or not he would have a knack for it, not even Pippin himself.

After nearly three years the worst pain had faded for Pippin and was now mostly an aching memory. Merry knew it would hurt Pippin all of his life and that he would never stop missing Diamond, but Pippin had gotten out of the darkest night now and had gotten his life back on track. He no longer locked himself up in his bedroom, or broke down in uncontrollable sobs. He was almost back to his old self again. Almost. As close as he would ever get, Merry assumed.

Faramir was nearly three years old and growing nicely. He had been terribly upset the year before when Merry had become Master and they had had to move from Crickhollow to Brandy Hall, and Estella had spent many long nights by his side when he wouldn't stop crying for his old room at Crickhollow. But after a couple of weeks he had settled in and by now he was every bit as much at home at the Hall as he had ever been at Crickhollow.

Merry kept a book of his progress which he wrote a few words in every day, planning on giving it to Pippin later down the road when his cousin finally woke up and realised how much he had missed out on. The book followed the child's progress, it included Faramir's first word, which had been "mushroom", when he took his first step and when he got his first teeth. Merry had even cut off a lock of hair once it started to grow on the boy's head and put it in the book. When Dawn had been born two years ago he had started to do the same for her and when little Meduselda saw the light of day six months after Merry became Master he had begun writing a book for her. The books he kept for his own children he planned on giving to them at their 33rd birthdays, or perhaps at their weddings. Soon there would be a fourth book to start writing.

He shook his head hard and tried to focus on the job at hand. His meeting was only thirty minutes away and he wanted to be able to settle matters today. He hated when one meeting turned into three meetings turned into nothing being done for over a month. His father had been an expert at prolonging matters, dragging them out for weeks and sometimes months even, Merry preferred getting things over and done with right away. He was far more efficient than his father had been, though some felt he was too efficient, used to the comfort of not having to settle anything at the first meeting.

When Merry first became Master he had found that his father had left behind a huge mess in the financial department, which had taken Merry until Meduselda's birth to sort out. His father was known as Saradoc Scattergold, a name Merry found he had well earned. He had loved spending money but never had much concern as to where money would be coming in from. Merry had been forced to rework their tax system, which had made him very unpopular for a while until the Hobbits of Buckland began to realise that without money coming in to Brandy Hall eventually no money would be able to come out. In exchange for the taxes Merry had arranged for the medics not to charge anything when Hobbits came to them for help, which had unfortunately turned out to be like finding gold for the hypochondriacs of Buckland. That led to a new decision that every Hobbit got three visits for free each year, and should there be any medical situation which needed more treatments then a medic had to write an application to Merry and he could approve it or deny it. That had stopped most of the hypochondriacs, at least for now.

Once the finances had been sorted out Merry had begun to try and fix Brandy Hall up. The great Hall was starting to get shabby, maintenance had not been what it ought to be when finances were low. But that was to be changed, unfortunately that brought on a chaos of meetings, decisions and brand new financial problems. It had taken him an additional six months to get everything to calm down and flow without friction. After only a year as Master Merry was beginning to wish he had stayed in Rohan under Éomer King, needing only to serve and not to decide. But he never complained for long. All in all life was good, and he knew most Hobbits liked him as Master.

**XX  
XX**

"There's a good lad, already tucked in" Merry said and sat down by Faramir's bedside to tuck him in for the night. "Did you have an exhausting day?"

Faramir nodded and yawned. Merry put his candle down on the nightstand and pulled the covers up over the boy's shoulders, making sure he was warm and cuddled up for the night. The security blanket was in its place and Faramir was ready to go to sleep.

"Will you sing me a lullaby, Da?" Faramir asked.

Merry frowned.

"Faramir… You must not call me Da."

"Why not? Dawn says Da."

"Yes she does" Merry said. "But you see, a Da is a quite special person, there's only one Da for each child."

"But Dawn and I can share" Faramir felt.

"That's not really how it works, little one" Merry said. "You see, you have your very own Da, someone different from Dawn's Da. Your father is not here, but he is the only father you've got. I am not your father, even though I take care of you. Do you understand?"

Faramir shook his head and seemed displeased. It didn't make sense to him that Dawn could get to call Merry Da but not Faramir. After all, Faramir had been around longer than Dawn. He should have first dibs.

"Your father is a lad named Peregrin Took" Merry said. "He lives at the Great Smials in Tuckburough."

"But Estella is my Ma, then you must be my Da" Faramir argued. "All the other children at the Hall have a Da who sleeps in the same bed with their Ma, and eats at the same table, and tucks in the same children at night."

"Darling, Estella is not your Ma."

"Then who is?"

"Her name is Diamond" Merry said. "And she is every bit as fine as the gemstone. You cannot see her with your eyes, or hear her with your ears, but she is always where you are. Sometimes mothers go away and their children have to be taken care of by others. You know how my father went away last year and we moved here?"

"Did my father go away too?"

"You will meet your father someday" Merry said.

"But I want you to be my father" Faramir complained. "I want Estella to be my mother! Why do you have to have other babies who can call you Ma and Pa?"

"Estella and I love you just as much as we love Dawn and Meduselda, it is important that you know that" Merry said. "But one day your father will be here and you will be with him."

"I don't want to be with him! I want to be with you!"

"Estella and I will always be around" Merry promised. "You are lucky, Faramir. You have not only us but a father who is waiting for you. And when the time is right he will take you to the Great Smials. Until then I need you to know that although we love you, you mustn't call us Mother and Father. Those are only words anyway, Faramir."

"But why? Why can't I call you that?"

"Well, you know how I am called the Master of Buckland?" Merry said. "And even though sometimes someone else takes care of my duties and my work when I'm ill, I am the only Master. It's the same with your Father, love. Even though you have Estella and I to look after you, you have only one Father."

"Promise that you love me" Faramir said.

"Insatiably" Merry smiled and kissed him on the forehead. "Oh, here comes Estella. Let her sing you that lullaby, or we shall be here all evening. Goodnight, child."

He got up and vacated his stool for Estella to sit down. He ran his hand through her hair on his way past her and left her to sing Faramir a song. He finished the nightly round by going into the nursery and snuffing out the light standing on a dresser. Holding his own candle he looked down at Dawn in her crib. The little girl slept peacefully with her thumb in her mouth. Merry felt no different looking at her than he did looking at Faramir. It had felt good to be called Da by him, but Merry knew it would not be fair. He was in fact not Faramir's father, and it would only be confusing to the child when one day there were two Das. He had no plans on keeping Faramir in the dark about his true heritage, some day Faramir would be the Thain, he would not live all his life at Brandy Hall. The more he was prepared for that, the better.

**XX  
XX**

"Merry darling…" Estella mumbled, elbowing Merry to wake him up.

"Mmmmm… what is it?"

"Could you get me a glass of water?"

Merry sighed and got out of bed. He searched for his robe and found it underneath the bed, however it had gotten there, and pulled it on with a huge yawn. He stumbled out into the hallway on his way to the barrel of water they kept in their kitchen. Stupidly enough he hadn't lit a candle to bring with him, so he didn't see the wooden toy duck someone had left out in the hall. He cursed to himself and gripped his aching toe which had been run right into it.

"Whoever left that there is going to be in big trouble tomorrow!" he groaned through gritted teeth and limped into the kitchen.

He found the barrel and grabbed a glass from the counter. He filled it up with water and finished it for himself. It was July by now, and quite hot. He sat down by the table while he drank the water and remembered all the years he had seen in this kitchen. When he was young Frodo Baggins had stayed here. He had been taken in by Merry's parents, just like Merry and Estella had taken Faramir in. Funny, Merry had never thought of that before. Frodo had been older though when his parents died, and Faramir still had one parent alive. Merry wished Frodo had never left, he missed his old friend very much. Frodo had been like a brother to him when he was little. He hoped his children would one day have a friend like Frodo.

He reminisced about old times for quite some time, then suddenly realised that Estella wanted her water. He jumped up and dug up a carafe to fill up with water, so that they could both relieve their thirst without having to get out of bed again. On his way back to the bedroom he nearly tripped over the wooden duck and spilled out some water.

He put the carafe and the glass down on his nightstand and got into bed. He ran his finger over his toe to see if he was bleeding, but it only seemed bruised. Funny how something as small as a toe could hurt so much.

"Here's your water" he said to Estella and held out the glass for her.

Estella mumbled something incoherent and rolled away from him, taking the covers with her. Merry frowned. She had gone back to sleep!

"Estella!" he said in a loud voice and shook her.

"Merry go away…" she mumbled.

"Oh no I won't! Not only have I gotten you your water, it cost me a damaged toe to get it for you! Now you drink it, you owe me!"

She opened her eyes and turned to squint at him.

"What?"

"Your water. Paid for with pain and suffering!"

Estella giggled and took the glass he offered him. She drank it surprisingly fast and then wiped her mouth with the back of the hand.

"Thank you" she said. "What was that about pain and suffering now?"

"My toe" Merry complained, making a bigger deal out of it than it was, taking the opportunity to have her affections to himself.

"Oh, poor sweetheart" she said, amused by his behaviour and making a much bigger deal out of his injury than it deserved. "Do you think you will be able to walk ever again? You must fight, for the children and me!"

"I've heard you can make a wooden foot if you lose your own" Merry joked.

"Silly lad" she giggled and handed him the glass. "Go back to sleep and I promise you it won't hurt in the morning."

"Someone left a stupid wooden duck out in the hall" Merry told her as he put the glass aside and settled down to go to sleep.

"Might have been you" she said. "You were playing with it out in the hall earlier."

"I was not!"

"Yes you were, you and Faramir" Estella said and yawned. "Go to sleep now, dear. And next time, make sure you put all toys away before you go to bed."

Merry glanced at her and couldn't help but smile. She still had most of the covers and he tugged at them to make her let go. With an annoyed grunt she let him have his share and then they both closed their eyes and went back to sleep.

**XX  
XX**

A few days later Merry was woken up by someone fiercely shaking his arm. Faramir was standing by the bed with his security blanket in his hand and a thumb in his mouth.

"Faramir, what's the matter?" Merry asked.

"I woke up and I can't go back to sleep. Where is Estella? She's not in bed."

"Estella was not feeling well" Merry said. "She's in another room. She'll feel better in a day. Why couldn't you go back to sleep?"

"I just couldn't. I thought I heard someone moaning.It scared me."

"There's nothing to be scared of" Merry said. "Everything is fine. Do you want me to go tuck you in? I promise you that you'll fall right back asleep."

Faramir shook his head.

"I want to stay with you. I'm scared."

"Scared of what?"

Faramir didn't answer. Merry got out of bed and lifted Faramir up in his arms. He carried the boy back to his own room and tucked him in.

"I will stay here until you're sleeping again" he promised. "There is nothing to be frightened of. Look at me. Would I lie to you?"

"No."

"No. There's a good little boy now, go back to sleep."

"I want Estella."

"Estella is ill" Merry told him. "You can see her in a few days."

"Would I get to see her now if she were my mother?"

"Faramir that has nothing to do with it" Merry said. "I promise you that you will see her before Dawn does, okay?"

Faramir nodded. Merry stroke his cheek and hoped he would go back to sleep soon.

"Will you sing me a lullaby even though it's late and I've already heard one tonight?"

"You can even pick which one" Merry said.

"Sing the one about the three men wandering down the road."

Merry sang him the lullaby and Faramir went back to sleep. Merry sat by his side for a while, in case he would wake up. It was the first time Faramir had brought up the parent thing again since he had asked about it in February, it made Merry feel uncomfortable. He didn't want Faramir to feel jealous of the children Merry and Estella had, but they couldn't give him special benefits just to compensate that he was not their biological child. They both hoped he knew they cared a lot for him, but perhaps it was not so strange that the boy wanted them to acknowledge him as their own child. They were the only parents he knew of.

"Pip, you had better come for your child soon or this is going to get really hard" Merry mumbled when he left the room and went back to his own bedroom.

On his way back he stopped by the new room which Dawn had been given for her own. She had been sleeping in the nursery up until her second birthday but now she was old enough to have a room of her own. Merry walked inside and sat down by her bedside, running his hands through her curls, careful not to wake her up.

"Sweetheart…" he whispered. "You think of Faramir as your brother, don't you? Just as much as you think of Meduselda as your sister. With every child we have we're going to have to explain why Faramir is not their brother. Yet he's just as much a part of the family as you and your sister."

Dawn slept peacefully, unaware of the unusual family structure around her. Merry leaned over and kissed her carefully on the cheek. Then he got up and went back to his own bed, falling asleep instantly, safe in the knowledge that he had his family around him.

**XX  
XX**

When Merry went back to sleep Pippin was still awake, staring at the ceiling. Finally he decided he could not take it anymore and tossed aside his covers and went out into the kitchen. He made himself some tea and sat down by the table, not feeling the taste of the drink.

"Pippin" his mother's drowsy voice said.

Pippin looked up and saw her coming into the kitchen, yawning as she pulled her robe around her.

"Sorry Mother" he said. "I didn't mean to wake you. I didn't wake Father, did I?"

"No, he's still asleep."

"There's tea if you want some."

"No thank you, that will only keep me up." She sat down opposite him. "What are you doing up at this hour?"

"I couldn't sleep."

"Why is that?"

"I don't know… I was asleep, but then I woke up. And everything was so quiet, I felt so lonely…"

"I thought you had stopped having those nights" Eglantine Took said.

"So did I" Pippin admitted. "But apparently I'll never quite get over losing her."

"Nobody expected you to be a widower at such a young age" Eglantine said. "You just have to make the most of what is handed to you. You have always been a fighter, child."

"Yes, I suppose I have" Pippin said and sipped his tea. "And I suppose these nights will get easier to handle as well. With the passing of time, these wounds will hurt less and less. It has already begun. Part of me resents it."

"Peregrin your love for her is not worth less just because the pain gets easier" Eglantine said and put her hand on top of his. "Trust me, Diamond would not want you to think of her and feel pain. She was not like that."

"No, she was loving and happy" Pippin said with a smile. "She smiled more often than anyone I've ever known."

"Do you ever wonder… if your child does the same?"

"Mother don't start that with me."

"Think about it Peregrin" she said and rose. "Maybe if there was a little boy sleeping in your bed you would not wake up and feel so lonely."

"Duly noted."

"Go to sleep" Eglantine said. "And when tomorrow comes, think about it. I miss my grandson, I miss getting the chance to watch him grow."

"Thank you Mother, that is quite enough."

Eglantine left the room and Pippin decided he didn't want his tea. He left his cup on the counter for someone else to take care of in the morning and went back to his bedroom. As he crawled into bed he thought about his mother's words. His father had implied too that perhaps he needed someone sleeping next to him, though Paladin had had a new wife in mind. Eglantine had a whole other suggestion. Pippin discarded both, determined not to give in to anyone else's opinion. Only he knew what was best for him. The very thought of taking another wife made him cringe, he could never accept another lass being Mistress Took when he became Thain, that role was Diamond's and Diamond's alone. And as for letting the child come stay at the Great Smials, Pippin didn't want to hear about it. But if only he wasn't so achingly lonely… He wondered if Merry could be convinced to come stay for a few days, he knew he wouldn't be lonely if he woke up in the night to Merry's calm breathe. But Merry had enough on his hands at Brandy Hall, he could not spare a few days just like that. And he would insist on bringing the child if he came.

"Learn to be lonely, Pippin old lad…" Pippin whispered and closed his eyes. "Learn to be lonely."

**XXX  
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I will have the next chapter up in about three weeks. Please leave a review and let me know what you think! If you've gotten this far you must have some opinion, whether it be good or bad.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's note**: Well it's been a few weeks but here is chapter four! I don't think I have any comments for this one, save for having given Diamond Took's parents names. I couldn't find them listed anywhere so I used my imagination. If anyone happens to know their real names then I'd be happy to know!

**Disclaimer**: You know the drill…

**XXX  
XXX  
XXX**

Pippin swallowed. His mouth felt dry yet he could not stop swallowing. His eyes were as dry as his mouth, there were no tears to shed. There was nothing but emptiness right now, how he hated feeling so empty.

He sat alone in his father's study, holding an envelope in his hands, twirling it around absentmindedly. Inside the envelope was the letter his father had written that was to be sent to the Master of Buckland right away. Pippin had been on his way to send it, but now there was no point in it anymore.

Earlier in the morning Paladin Took, Thain Paladin I, had succumbed to his illness and passed away. Pippin could not understand it. Two years ago his father had been hurt in a hunting accident, nearly losing his life, but he had survived. How could he survive such an accident yet lose his battle against something as common as pneumonia? How could he be so strong yet so weak at the same time?

Tuckburough grieved its Thain. Thain Paladin had been a good leader, he had kept things well in Tuckburough, even managing to keep the spirits up when the Shire was besieged. The Hobbits mourned their loss, probably scared of what would happen now. Five years ago they would all have been confident that the new Thain would bring them to even better times, he had after all proven his worth years ago, seeing them through where the Thain had not. But that was then. Their new leader was not who he had been then, he was nothing but a sullen, serious Hobbit who could beat any Brandybuck or Baggins in a battle for queerness any time. It was not the kind of leader Pippin had wanted to be. He could not blame them for being nervous about his abilities, he was probably more frightened than they were, but he found he missed the confidence they had once had in him. He knew how difficult Merry's first year as Master had been, yet he had had the full support of the Buckland Hobbits to see him through.

Without bothering to knock Pippin's sister Pervinca entered, looking at her younger brother for a moment before speaking.

"That letter…" she said.

"What about it?"

"Father asked for it to be delivered right away."

Pippin wanted to ask her what the point was. Their father was dead, nothing the letter had to say could possibly make any difference to him now. But he knew what his sister must be thinking. Not even this could her brother do. He got up and slowly walked over to her.

"Is there a pony saddled?"

"There should be."

"I'll return shortly."

He walked past her and made his way through the familiar halls out to the stables where he grabbed the first saddled pony he could find by the reins. Someone protested, but he didn't care to listen. If this letter was so important then whatever that Hobbit needed the pony for it could surely wait. He led the pony outside and began to make way for Buckland, where news had not yet arrived of the passing of the Thain earlier in the day.

**XX  
XX**

Merry looked up with a disapproving frown when Pippin came in to his study unannounced. He was in the middle of a talk with a widowed lass who needed financial help to feed her three children and was not happy to be interrupted. Pippin didn't acknowledge the Hobbit seated opposite Merry with as much as a glance.

"I have a letter for you" he said. "Thain Paladin demanded you should have this right away."

"I'm so sorry Madam Bolger, we shall have to continue this later" Merry said to his visitor. "Speak with my secretary and she will book you for a meeting as soon as possible! You won't have to wait out in the hallway or anything!"

He got up and walked over to Pippin, snatching the letter from his cousin with an annoyed glare. His visitor excused herself and went out into the hall to find Merry's secretary. Merry walked over and shut the door to the curious eyes out in the hall, belonging to seven Hobbits who had come to see the Master with different errands. He went back over to Pippin while opening the envelop and reading the note inside. Then he put the note in his pocket and placed his hand on Pippin's shoulder.

"Come" he said.

They walked past the waiting Hobbits, who loudly complained that visiting hours seemed to be over so soon. Pippin had nothing he felt like saying and Merry didn't speak either as they strode down the halls and eventually ended up outside. Merry turned to speak with his cousin once they were too far away from anyone who might hear them.

"When did he die?" he asked.

"What makes you think he's dead?" Pippin had to ask.

"The note" Merry said. "In it he says that he will be dead by the time it reaches me, and then it details some instructions."

"Instructions for what?"

"You are going to be Thain now" Merry said. "Someone has to hold the ceremony to make it official. Your predecessor needed me to know some things. So when did Uncle Paladin die?"

"At 8:15 this morning" Pippin said and swallowed once more.

"8:15? And you're only getting this to me now? It's past elevenzies!"

"Yes thank you, I know that. I lost my father this morning Merry, forgive me if I'm slacking a bit in my duties."

"I'm sorry" Merry said. "I didn't mean it like that. I know how this feels, it is not pleasant. Grieving your father while everybody needs you to step up and take his place. Becoming who you were born to be just because your father passed on. People expecting you to be excited even though it's a time for sorrow."

"There's been a lot of time for sorrow these past years" Pippin said. "I'm a veteran now. I can handle it. I'll take on the thainship like I'm supposed to, just tell me when and where."

"It needs to be as soon as possible" Merry said. "Your father will receive a proper burial on Wednesday, that's two days from today. The next morning you become Thain Peregrin I."

"So Thursday it is" Pippin said. "Will you be there before then, Merry? Will you come see the family?"

"Of course I will, Pip. He was my uncle! Mother is going to be devastated to hear this."

"I hope she will come as well" Pippin said. "How is she? Is she feeling any better?"

"Yes but I think she's too weak to be able to go anywhere" Merry said. "She won't live for much longer either, I fear."

Pippin nodded. He felt surprisingly calm. He had not shed any tears yet, he wondered if he would at all. He had cried enough for a lifetime already.

"I don't have a father anymore" he said. "Gosh, how empty that makes me feel…"

Merry stopped walking and looked at his cousin. Pippin stopped as well and wondered what the grim look on Merry's face meant. Merry took a deep breath and prepared for the confrontation he knew was about to follow.

"This is the end of your nonsense with your son" he said.

"I'm not following…"

"You have been finding excuses for more than four years now as to why you cannot see your boy. On Thursday that ends. When I come to the Great Smials I am taking Faramir with me, and you will look at the child and acknowledge him as your son and heir. I do not care whether it hurts you to look at him. I do not care whether you believe he killed your wife. I do not care if you have completely suppressed the fact that you even have a son. I do not care about all your troubles and nonsense and excuses. I do not care about any of that. If you don't take a stand on Thursday morning and give Faramir everything that is his right by birth then so help me Pippin, none of the sorrows or hardships you have seen in your life this far will even be able to compare to how horrid I will make your life! Trust me when I say this!"

Pippin didn't answer at first. It took him a moment for the words to sink in. Then he shook his head in disbelief.

"Has it come to that? You threatening me? Is that a proper way for the Master and the Thain to communicate?"

"Faramir is your son, bred by you and born to you, I don't care how you feel about the child, you will allow him that which is his right by birth. Do you understand?"

"Of course I understand!"

"Good. Then you will see him on Thursday. For four years you have pretended that you have no son, but he is your heir no matter who raises him and on Thursday he shall be such declared for everyone to hear it! That amazing little child will finally get a glimpse of what is his, and a face to the name Father."

"That's quite enough, Merry" Pippin said and held up his hands. "Bring the kid along. Do whatever you like. Is that what the letter said? That you should make sure there's an heir to Thain Peregrin? That's all our fathers ever cared about, stupid heirs."

"I raise him, Pippin" Merry said. "I see him every day. I know what a sweet child he is. I would go to great lengths to make sure he isn't robbed of his birthright, especially if his father has gone more than a little crazy."

"Like I said… Bring the child. I've never had any other intentions than that. I will make sure everyone knows he is mine, and that he is to be Thain when I pass on. Then you can entrust him with my mother, for I won't have time to baby-sit if that's what you're hoping."

"All I want is that you acknowledge him. It's about time."

"If you say so."

Merry sighed and walked over to his cousin. The wedge between them was growing deeper, Merry didn't wish for it to be this way. He put his hand on his cousin's arm.

"Maybe we should take a step back and remember why he is in my care in the first place" he said. "You gave him to me because you trusted me more than anyone else, am I wrong?"

"You're not wrong."

Merry gripped Pippin's arm and led him to a tree where they both sat down. Merry took his cousin's hands in his own.

"You trusted me… not because we are cousins, but because we are friends. The best kind of friends. Friends who will always be there to catch you when you fall."

"The truest friends" Pippin nodded.

"So why do we fight? You didn't entrust him to me so that we could argue, I'm fairly certain of that. Let's not do this… Let's just get along, like we always have in the past. I will bring Faramir and you will see him. When you do, you will understand."

"Whatever you say…" Pippin said with little faith.

"You know… If you knew sweet little Faramir… If only you could see what a child he is. How he runs around the halls, full of laughter and of play. Do you know what they say? They say that it is like having Young Master Peregrin around, it's just like when Young Master Peregrin was a child and would come visit. He looks like you, he has those eyes of yours. Cousin if you knew your son… what you wouldn't give just to get to hold him."

Pippin rose and brushed the dirt off his cape.

"I should get back to the Smials" he said.

"Pippin…"

"We shall be expecting you to come by."

Merry remained by the tree and watched Pippin go. He was surprised that he had left, Merry had thought he was about to open up. But who could blame him for being distracted, it was not every day you lost your father.

A leaf fell from the tree and landed on Merry's shoulder. He looked up at the yellow leaves above him. When had it become September? Time went by so fast these days. Being buried in work might perhaps make time pass faster for Pippin as well, which was probably just what he needed. He had been stuck in June of 1430 for far too long now. Merry hoped he wouldn't get stuck in September of 1434 as well.

**XX  
XX**

"I won't be gone more than a day" Merry said and packed the last things in his backpack, shoving aside his Elf cape which fell in the way when he leaned forward.

"No rush" Estella said. "Things can get complicated the day after big events like today's, the new Thain might need some help tomorrow morning getting things settled. You've been away for days at a time before, we can manage."

"Yes, but this time it's different" Merry said and closed his pack. "What time is it? We must get moving before ten."

"It's a quarter to" Estella said. "And you look very handsome. I'm sure you will do a fine job. Are you nervous?"

Merry gave her a smile and lifted his pack up. He was clad in his Rohirric armour, which he only used for special occasions, and of course his Elven cape. It felt good to wear these clothes again, he had in truth been quite nervous but once he was dressed in his formal outfit again all his nervousness seemed to be washed away. It was something about the clothes which filled him with confidence.

"No nerves" he told his wife. "Everything will be fine. I'm proud of Pippin, I hope this day will be special for him. It must be odd having your cousin be the one to perform the ceremony, I had my uncle do it, he had been Thain for as far back as I could remember."

"I'm sure Pippin is honoured to have you performing the ceremony" Estella said.

"We should get going" Merry said. "Where is Faramir?"

"In his room, packing the last of his things. I told him he could only bring one toy and he's having a hard time deciding which one to bring."

"I'm sorry you have to stay at home" Merry said. "I know you would have liked to be part of this."

"Don't worry about me" Estella said and smiled. "I will stay here with the girls. It will be fine."

"I'm sure you'll have a good time without us lads" Merry said and placed a kiss on her five months pregnant belly. "Take good care of our girls, and our little lad."

"What makes you so sure it will be a lad?" Estella asked with a smile and caressed her belly.

"We will need one if Faramir leaves" Merry said and opened the door to step out into the hallway.

"Do you think he will?" Estella asked.

Hearing the tone in her voice Merry stopped and gave her a reassuring smile.

"It is possible. We've had four wonderful years with him Estella, what more can we ask for? Trust me, whatever happens it will be fine."

"I know you think it's selfish, but I'm hoping you will bring our boy home again tomorrow."

"We'll see what happens" Merry said. "Come, let's go find the lad in question. We really must get going."

Estella followed him to Faramir's room, where the young Took was just finishing packing his backpack with the help of Dawn and Meduselda. The one year old toddler, Merry and Estella's third daughter, sat on the floor and admired the scene with wide eyes. The room was a mess, Faramir had brought every toy out to give them all a fair trial before he picked one to bring with him, and he didn't feel like picking them up again and putting them in their proper place. He didn't really have time to do that either, he knew they had to get going soon.

"There you are!" Merry said. "Ready to go, Young Master Took?"

"Ready!" Faramir said and jumped down on the floor.

"Okay, have you girls said bye to Faramir?" Merry asked his daughters.

"Yes we have" Meduselda said. "Ages ago."

"Good, now come say bye to Papa before I have to go."

The girls ran over and hugged him tight. Merry gave them each a kiss on the head. Estella lifted the toddler to her feet and helped her walk over to her father for a goodbye kiss.

"You be good, Summer" Merry said and hugged the so far youngest child in the family. "And all three of you girls do as Mother tells you, you hear? I will be back tomorrow."

He reached out his hand to Faramir and grabbed his walking stick. With a wave to the female part of the family he led Faramir out the door and on the way to the festivities at the Great Smials.

**XX  
XX**

Pippin barely had time to stop and catch his breath. There were so many things that needed to be done and nothing seemed to be ready. He had trusted his sisters to be able to handle most of it but for some reason everything seemed to be going wrong at once and everybody turned to him. He braced himself and took care of one emergency after the other, using it as practice for when the real deal would begin the next day. By the time the sun had reached zenith everything seemed to be in order and ready for the ceremonies to begin, but it had taken a lot of effort.

"Just in time" Pippin thought.

He went outside to overlook the small field where he would be officially announced Thain Peregrin I, new master of Tuckburough and The Took. He found he didn't have any energy left to be nervous. It couldn't be all that bad, not when Merry was leading the ceremony. It felt good knowing that Merry would be playing the active part today, all Pippin had to do was give his little speech and follow his cousin's instructions.

He stopped right in the middle of the field, at the very spot he would become Thain. He shadowed the sun with his eyes and looked around. Chairs where placed everywhere yet they had not begun to fill up with Hobbits. They still had another thirty minutes before the ceremony was to start, and the Tooks were known for arriving at the last minute.

He turned around in a full circle, overlooking every inch of the area, proud of what he saw. When he had gotten almost a full turn he saw Merry not far from him. The sudden appearance of his cousin startled him, he had not heard him arrive.

"Hullo, Pip" Merry said.

"Hullo" Pippin answered.

He smiled at his cousin, who was not his old friend Merry today. Today he was Master Meriadoc of Buckland, clad in his most official clothes and in no mood for jests and games. Pippin wore his Elven cape as well, together with his Gondorian armour. He and Merry complemented each other. From today they would not be just Merry and Pippin, best friends and cousins, they would be Master Meriadoc and Thain Peregrin. They had gazed forward to this day from childhood, now it was upon them.

Then Pippin saw the child in Merry's company. His hand slowly fell down to his side as he looked upon the four year-old lad clinging to Merry's leg and hiding his face in Merry's cape. The boy was shy and seemed frightened to meet him. So this was the child.

"Aren't you going to say hullo?" Merry asked the boy, gently urging him on.

The boy peeked his head out from the cape.

"Hullo" he said, barely audible.

"You can do better than that" Merry said, but the child hesitated. "Go on!"

Hesitantly the child let go of Merry's leg and bowed.

"Top of the morning to you, sir" he said and then clung to Merry again.

Merry chuckled.

"He likes that expression" he explained.

Pippin saw the child lift his eyes from the cape and glance at him, and he returned the bow.

"Greetings, young master" he said.

"Do you know who this is?" Merry asked the boy.

Pippin wrinkled his nose at the tone in Merry's voice. It seemed in its place when Merry spoke so softly and childlike to his daughters, but when he spoke with this little lad it just rang funny in Pippin's ears. The little Hobbit shook his head no at Merry's question and didn't seem very interested. It was clear that he was very uncomfortable.

"You'll have to excuse him, he's a little shy" Merry said to Pippin and then stroke the boy over the head. "This is Peregrin Took, your father. He is going to be the new Thain today."

"Congratulations" Pippin head the child mumble.

"He'll warm up" Merry said to his cousin. "It's just a little much to take all at once… Come along Faramir, let's go find Grandma! You can sit with her during the ceremony until I call your name, okay?"

"She's in the kitchen" Pippin informed them.

"Thanks" Merry said. "I'll see you in a few minutes."

Pippin watched Merry lead the boy off to the kitchen. He wrinkled his nose. Faramir. The child sure did not look like a Faramir. Pippin wondered why Merry had chosen that name, it seemed ridiculous to Pippin. He couldn't quite see what Merry was making so much fuss about. This shy little boy would have to toughen up a lot to live up to his Took family name.

**XX  
XX**

Evening came after a long ceremony which had officially made Pippin the new Thain. The ceremony had been interrupted halfway through for everyone to sit down for a meal, then it had been taken up again and lasted for quite some time. Pippin was very hungry by the time they were done, and longed for supper which was being served all around them. There was no official supper with the Thain or Master as toastmaster, it had been found generations ago that such a thing didn't work after such a long ceremony.

Pippin was pleased. The ceremony had gone well, Merry had done an excellent job and Pippin felt like he had been welcomed as the Thain, which he had not been too sure to count on. The only element which hadn't gone smoothly was when Pippin was to acknowledge Faramir Took as his son and heir and show him up to the gathered Hobbits. Faramir had been very shy and didn't want to come out in the centre of everyone's attention, he wanted to stay with his grandma where nobody stared at him. After a few minutes Pippin had walked up to his mother and lifted the boy over to his arms, acknowledging him officially at that spot even though not everyone could see them from there. He had glanced over his shoulder and seen Merry smile reassuringly at the child, then he had handed him back to Eglantine, happy to have that part over and done with. All in all the whole thing had run smoothly and Pippin felt happy.

As the Hobbits began to scatter, each and every one of them heading for the buffet tables, Pippin stuck his arm under Merry's and walked slowly with him across the field.

"How are you feeling now, Master Meriadoc?" he asked. "You did a wonderful job. Our fathers would be very proud of you."

"Things went really well" Merry said. "Tuckburough seems to be pleased with the new Thain, just like I predicted. How does it feel to be Thain Peregrin I?"

"It feels good" Pippin said. "I only wish Diamond could be here to share this day with me, but by now I know she's looking in on me from wherever she is. And of course I wish my father could have seen me, but that is never possible for the Thain."

"I'm proud to call you Thain and my cousin" Merry said and gave Pippin's arm a pat. "Welcome to office."

"Do you know what I wish my first accomplishment as Thain to be?"

"Tell me."

"To finish a meal within the next half hour" Pippin said. "I'm starved! Listening to you talk can really work you up and appetite."

"I thought I heard some loud grumblings when you held your speech as well" Merry smiled and gave his cousin a teasing nudge. "Supper it is!"

They walked together across the field, content with how the day had gone and with being in each other's company. Today they had not said an unfriendly word to one another, everything had been as good as it usually was between them. They both wished the feeling would never go away, it felt nice to be this content in each other's company once more. Wanting to hold on to the feeling they took their good time walking back, most Hobbits around them not only served themselves supper but finished their meals by the time the pair had walked the distance back to the Smials. Pippin's stomach was complaining loudly.

They stopped when they reached the buffet tables, and heard someone call out Merry's name. They both turned their heads in the direction the call had come from and saw the new heir of the Thain together with his grandmother just a few feet away.

"There you are!" Merry said with a smile.

He let go of Pippin's arm and walked over to Faramir and Eglantine. Pippin bit his upper lip, he didn't know why it was so hard for him that Merry had let go. He saw his cousin kneel down to get in level with the four year-old.

"It's been a very long day for you" Merry said. "Did you get anything to eat?"

"I had supper" Faramir said.

"Good. How does it feel to be the Thain's heir?"

Faramir didn't answer, he was too shy. Merry smiled and tousled his curls.

"It's six o'clock and past your usual bedtime" he said. "Don't tell Estella I let you stay up so long! Off to bed you go."

"Tuck me in" Faramir asked.

"I promised your father I would have supper with him" Merry said. "I didn't get a chance to eat yet."

He looked up and spotted Faramir's maternal grandparents glancing over at them from their table, which was within hear sight.

"How about you let your granny and grandpa tuck you in tonight?" he said. "I'm sure they have lots of wonderful stories that I've never heard before! They can tell you tonight, then you tell me tomorrow and perhaps we can tell them to Dawn and Meduselda and Summer. Would you like that?"

Faramir nodded. Merry grinned and looked over at Diamond's parents. He rose and gently shoved Faramir over to them, asking them if they could perhaps tuck the lad in. As he had expected they were both more than happy to get some time with their grandson and within a minute they had lifted Faramir up and disappeared inside the Smials. Merry returned to Pippin and grabbed a plate.

"I'm starved" he said. "What are you having?"

Pippin grabbed a plate and smiled. He looked forward to having Merry to himself tonight, as much as he could with all these people around at any rate.

"I don't know, I'm thinking of going with a little bit of everything."

"I'm planning on getting full on chicken" Merry said and grabbed a huge chicken wing. "Estella can't stand the smell of chicken when she's expecting, which is bad for me since chicken is my favourite. Oh, and look at those mashed potatoes! I'm going to have to go for seconds!"

"Save some room for dessert" Pippin recommended.

"Oh there's plenty of room. Am I correct in assuming Sam sent some gaffer ale?"

Pippin nodded and stole the ladle from his cousin before Merry could fill his plate entirely with mashed potatoes. He looked at all the food laid out before him and felt his mouth water. What a great fortune that they could sit down and enjoy this meal without any children or parents around to bother them.

**XX  
XX**

Pippin frowned when he heard someone shouting, a child as it seemed. He glanced over at Merry, deep in conversation with some Hobbit who had come up to congratulate Pippin. Merry didn't seem to have heard anything. Pippin was not quite able to relax and enjoy himself, some part of him was listening for trouble. He didn't want anything to go wrong on this night.

There was that cry again, this time Merry reacted to it as well. Through the crowds came young Faramir, dressed in his pyjamas, crying for Merry. Merry kneeled down when he saw him coming and put his arms on Faramir's shoulders.

"What are you doing out of bed?" he asked.

"I woke up and I couldn't find you!" Faramir cried.

"Find me? Well you found me now…"

Shortly after Faramir came Diamond's mother, Bellamy, frowning with her hands on her hips.

"I'm awfully sorry, he just ran off before I could stop him!"

"What is the meaning of all this?" Merry asked. "It's past nine in the evening, Faramir should be asleep!"

"I woke up and you were gone!" Faramir cried.

"You knew I was right out here" Merry said and wiped away a tear from the child's face. "You can't run away from your grandmother! You do as she tells you."

"But you were gone" Faramir insisted.

"But I'm here now" Merry said. "Calm down, Faramir. You know I wouldn't leave without you. Why would you think differently?"

"But Grandma said that I should be with her and Grandpa and not in Buckland, then you were gone when I woke up and they wouldn't let me see you!"

"When did she say that?" Merry asked. Faramir didn't answer. "Where did you hear that, Faramir?"

"I heard her say it through the door. That I should be in Long Cleeve. I didn't mean to listen, I promise! But she was talking out loud!"

Merry shook his head and wondered what had gotten into Diamond's mother. It was awfully clumsy of her to say something like that so that the child could overhear her. Pippin gave Bellamy an angry glare but she glared back just as angrily. Pippin averted his eyes first, looking down on his cousin and the child who had caused such a scene. And just when everything had been running so smoothly…

"You won't be moving to Long Cleeve" Merry assured Faramir.

Faramir nodded through his tears. He turned to look at his grandmother, who seemed horribly upset with him, and had to fight back a gasp when he saw the look on the Thain's face. The tall Hobbit standing right by Merry looked highly disapproving. Faramir quickly looked back into Merry's reassuring eyes.

"I don't want you to go away" Faramir said to him. "I want to stay with you. I don't want to leave Brandy Hall."

"I'm not going anywhere, I swear to you" Merry said. "You can go back to sleep and not worry, even if I'm not there when you wake up I'm still close by. Okay? Hug me with all your might, feel that I'm still here."

Faramir hugged him as hard as he could and buried his face in Merry's shoulder. The gentle shushing and the comforting hand stroking the back of his head made him feel a little better. He had been terrified to hear his grandmother talk of how he by rights should be living with them, and when he had woken up and been unable to find Merry he had been convinced that they had made Merry leave him there.

"I'm not going anywhere" Merry assured him. "I will always be here, come what may. Now don't cry any longer, everything will be just fine."

He rose with Faramir in his arms and ignored the look given to him by Bellamy. He looked at Pippin, who had his hands on his hips and a grim look on his face.

"Pip you will have to excuse me. I'll be back in a while, Faramir needs to get back into bed."

He walked off towards the Smials with the child in his arms. Pippin gave Bellamy an angry look, then turned and walked away. His festive mood was completely gone.

**XX  
XX**

Pippin put his pen down on his desk and looked at the two Hobbits seated on the other side of his writing desk. This was not how he had pictured his first morning as Thain, nor had he ever expected to be in a situation like this with Diamond's parents. But he had no intention of letting the scene last night go by unnoticed. He did not want another debacle like the one they had had the previous night. The sooner he let them know so, the better.

"You probably know already why I asked to see you" he said.

"Pippin, I must say I find this all most unnec--"

"Thain Peregrin" Pippin corrected. "I called you here as Thain. And we need to get some matters straight concerning the scene last night. The child said he overheard you saying that he should be raised by you and not by the Master. Folly. How many people have you been spreading this opinion to?"

"It doesn't matter" Malrobas Took tried to excuse it.

"It does so matter. Since when is it up to the two of you to decide how the future Thain is brought up?"

"I think we all know this is not about the future Thain" Malrobas said carefully. "It is about our grandson. A grandson we hardly get to see. A child who should be raised by us, his true family, not by a distant relation in Buckland."

"With this child it is **always** about the future Thain" Pippin said and leaned forward over his desk. "Do you know how to raise a Thain? I can assure you it requires more than baking bread and teaching them how to read. I left the child with Meriadoc, one who knows how to raise a Thain, and that decision was final. I will never hear you talk against it ever again, is that understood?"

"Peregrin…" Bellamy said and looked at her son-in-law with said eyes. "What has happened to you? Where does this harshness come from?"

Pippin rose from his chair and began walking slowly around the room.

"I made the best choice for the baby. A child needs a mother figure, not a grandmother. Nobody can say they're doing a bad job taking care of him over at Brandy Hall! Unless you have something that can prove otherwise then you will keep your opinions to yourselves. It is my decision to make where that boy grows up, not yours."

"I know it's been hard for you losing Diamond, but we lost her too" Malrobas said. "We don't want to lose her son as well!"

"All you need to do is speak with Merry, he won't have anything against you visiting at Brandy Hall! Why you felt you need to frighten the child in the middle of the night is beyond me. I will not discuss my choice of guardian for him with you, or with anyone. I don't care that you think he ought to be with close family instead of with Brandybucks, you're forgetting that Merry is not just my friend he is my cousin, he too is related to the child. Now what I want from you is that you Bellamy go talk to him and apologise for scaring him. Then you can talk to Merry if you wish and decide on a good time for you to come visit. But should word reach me that you've been talking to people about the child being moved to live with you then you won't be getting any more visits. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Thain" Bellamy said.

She rose together with her husband and bowed before leaving the room. They shared a look once they were back out in the hall. Neither of them approved of Pippin's new ways, but there was not much they could do about it. As little as they liked it they would have to accept that their grandson grew up among queer Brandybucks and not amongst the Tooks where he belonged.

Malrobas put an arm around Bellamy's shoulder and wished he could offer her some comfort. It was hard for them both not getting to spend enough time with Faramir. He was all they had left of Diamond and unlike Pippin they wanted to savour it.

They found Faramir and Merry packing their things to prepare to leave for the Hall. Merry let them be alone with the boy and went to find Pippin. He knocked on the door and found Pippin alone, doing paperwork.

"How are things?" he asked.

"I'm not sure, I haven't quite gotten adjusted yet" Pippin said. "I had a look at my schedule and honestly thought I would faint. But I'll get used to it."

"We are getting ready to leave" Merry said and closed the door behind him. "I left Faramir with his grandparents. He was a bit hesitant at first but they seemed to be doing fine when I left."

He sat down in one of the vacant chairs opposite Pippin's and brushed a curl of hair from his forehead. Pippin put his pen down and bit his upper lip.

"I spoke with them" he told Merry. "I made it clear that you will raise the child and nobody else. You shouldn't have any problems with them in the future."

"Good" Merry said. "What happened last night was unpleasant. I'm sorry if it spoiled your evening, it certainly seemed to dampen the mood of everyone nearby."

"It wasn't your fault" Pippin said. "Think nothing of it."

"Okay then. I should be on my way, I was hoping we'd be back home by lunch." He rose and smiled at the Thain. "You know where to find me if you need anything. Don't be afraid to ask for help, it can be tricky before you get the hang of it."

Pippin nodded and smiled back at him. When Merry left the room however he was not smiling. It was with a mixed feeling of relief and disappointment he would return to the Hall. Relief that he wouldn't have to send Faramir to the Smials or any place else, disappointed with the reaction which had never seemed to come in Pippin. One could not tell by looking at him that he had met his son for the first time the day before. Perhaps this would be more difficult than Merry had ever expected.

**XXX  
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XXX**

I'll try to have the next chapter up shortly, I promise! Please review, I'm always eager to hear your comments whether they be good or bad!


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's note**: I have no comments to this installment. This is pretty much an in-between chapter which I wrote when I just felt like writing.

**Disclaimer**: Same as always.

**XXX  
XXX  
XXX**

Merry tried to stifle a yawn and glanced at the clock on the wall. Still another forty minutes until they could have a break and eat something. He was growing more bored by the minute and tapped his foot impatiently.

On the other side of the desk Pippin went over a report with a frown on his face. The numbers weren't quite adding up, and it would take at least until their next break to be able to find where it had gone wrong. He was not nearly half as bored as his cousin and didn't even seem to notice Merry's fidgeting.

It was a Saturday afternoon and usually their day off. But there were some matters which they needed to work through together, the month after Pippin became Thain they had decided to improve the Brandywine Bridge, which was in much need of repair. However it was not entirely clear whether Tuckburough or Buckland should pay the larger amount, as the bridge was used just as much by Hobbits on both sides of the river. It had taken them nearly two months to get the finances in order and there were still a lot of errors. On their Thursday meeting they had decided to go through it all together on Saturday and perhaps get things in order by Monday. They met up at Brandy Hall after second breakfast and had worked until now.

"Can you make sense of it?" Merry asked.

"Mmmm, quiet" Pippin mumbled and studied the numbers carefully. "I don't quite understand this! What have the airheads done really, who calculated that the cost of nails would be way higher than the cost of wood?"

"I'm not making much progress on my end either" Merry said. "Turns out math is not my strong suit. I've calculated these numbers three times and I've gotten three different answers!"

"Here, let me" Pippin said and reached over the desk for Merry's papers. "You give this report a go, maybe it will make sense to you."

Merry took the report offered to him and looked through it. Pippin was right, someone had obviously done some serious errors when trying to estimate what would cost how much. Merry sighed and wished bad things to come over the Took lad who had been in charge of making a blueprint of how the bridge looked at the moment, and what changes would need to be made. He had gone three weeks past his deadline which had resulted in a flood of errors when the Hobbits who were next in line to take on the project began making "qualified guesses" in lack of blueprints to work from. It was all very tiresome and in truth Merry was not even interested in the bridge.

Children's voices could be heard from a nearby room. Pippin's ear twitched in that direction but he didn't say anything. They were not in the Master study, they were in the library in Merry's private halls, and the children were playing not far from where the two were working. Merry looked up from his report when the voices grew louder.

"Where is Bead?" he mumbled. "Sorry for the disturbance, Pippin. They should quiet soon, they know not to raise their voices like this."

"Quiet, I'm doing math in my head here!" Pippin said and mouthed the numbers as he added them.

Merry started over with the report and looked carefully at the figures, trying to figure out where the errors really began and how the first error affected the ones following it. Just as he thought he might be on to something he heard a loud cry, then a crash, then another cry.

A second later the door to the library flung open and Merry came out into the hall with Pippin behind him. From a nearby room a crying Meduselda came running, followed by an upset Dawn and an angry Faramir. Meduselda ran up to Merry hoping for some comfort.

"Keep your voices down!" Merry barked. "And what is this infernal racket? How are we supposed to get any work done around here?"

"He pushed me!" Meduselda yelled.

"She stole my toy!" Faramir cried back.

"But he pushed me!"

"You bit my toe first!"

"Enough!" Merry barked. "Frankly I don't care who did what to whom, I told you to be quiet and not wake Mother, she needs her rest! Faramir you know not to push, and Meduselda I don't want to hear that you've bitten anyone ever again! Faramir if she wants your toy just give it to her, she's two years old, she won't understand reasoning! And what was that crash I heard?"

Neither one of the children said anything. Faramir looked deeply ashamed, Dawn looked unhappy and Meduselda cried even harder. Merry looked from one child to the other.

"Well? Answer me!"

"It was an accident!" Faramir stuttered. "I, I didn't mean to!"

"Didn't mean to what? What was that crash?"

Pippin strode past the children and into the room they had come from. He gasped when he saw what had happened and hurried back out into the hall.

"Gimli's ceramic bowl!" he informed Merry. "Shattered in pieces!"

Merry's eyes went wide. He angrily turned to Faramir who looked deeply unhappy with having broken the bowl. It had not been his intention, he knew how valuable that bowl was. Merry grabbed him by the arm and looked firmly into his eyes.

"I don't want to see you in a good while!" he said angrily and gave the boy a brisk shove towards his room.

Faramir hurried off, glad to get to escape to his own room. He took a detour around Pippin, frightened by this Hobbit whom he'd only met once before in his life and who seemed to be as attached to the bowl as Merry was. He passed by the master bedroom just as the door opened and Estella came out.

"What is all this?" she asked in a sleepy voice.

"Are you happy now?" Merry asked the children. "You've woken Mother up, I told you she needed rest! Dry those tears Meduselda, they are only crocodile tears and I don't like them. Where is that blasted Bead?"

"What is wrong?" Estella asked. Meduselda ran up to her and hugged her legs. "What have you done, children?"

"Created a mess!" Merry said. "Broken the ceramic bowl I'm so fond of!"

"That was Faramir!" Dawn said.

"Stop it" Merry said. "It is not nice to pass out blame. You were just as much a part of this scene as he was young lady."

"Stop crying Meduselda" Estella said sharply.

Bead, the children's nurse, came hurrying down the hall just as Faramir closed the door to his room. She apologised a thousand times over and Merry gave her a displeased glare.

"Bead what do we pay you for? I told you to make sure the children were quiet and behaved! Now look what happened!"

"I'm so sorry, Master Merry!" Bead said.

"Estella go back to sleep" Merry said, speaking softer to hear than to the others. "I promise you, you will not be woken up again. Bead you take the girls somewhere and keep them quiet! I don't want to be interrupted again, is that clear?"

"Yes Master. I'm sorry Master. I was with Young Miss Summer, and--"

"Perhaps we should look into hiring a second nurse, since you cannot seem to manage all the children on your own."

Bead looked offended.

"Master Merry! I assure you, I am perfectly capable of looking after all the Master's children on my own!"

Pippin gave her a doubtful look and bent down to pry Meduselda, who had ran to him when Estella went back into her bedroom, off his legs. He figured Bead would not want to lose her prestigious position as the only nurse to the Master's children, especially not since that would give her an opponent to the privilege of being the nurse of the future Master, whenever he came along. In his own mind Pippin thought Merry was a fool for even hesitating, one nurse for four, soon to be five, children was at least three too few in Pippin's opinion. He handed Meduselda over to Bead, wondering slightly why the child had gone to him, she didn't know him all that well.

"Can we trust there will be no more interruptions, Bead?" Merry said.

"I promise, Master, you can count on me."

"Right" Merry said with rolling eyes and went back into the library.

Faramir could hear them through his door. He could hear Bead passing by with Meduselda and Dawn and he could hear Merry speaking with his friend. Tears fell down Faramir's cheeks. It had been an accident, he had been wrestling with Meduselda for the toy and he had knocked into the pedestal where Merry kept the bowl. It had fallen to the ground and broken, that was when Faramir had given Meduselda the push. He had never seen Merry this angry before, not only had he pushed Meduselda, he had woken Estella and broken the bowl. Filled with a childish fear that the adults wouldn't love him anymore he ran to his bed and cried into his pillow.

When he had no more tears to cry he fell asleep, waking up with a headache and a lump of guilt in his throat. He was hungry but he didn't know whether it was safe to come out or not. Merry had told him he didn't want to see him in a while, Faramir had no idea how long a time that was. But he decided to take his chances and snuck out into the hall.

He didn't see anybody. He could hear distant voices belonging to Bead and Dawn, aside from that everything was quiet. He tiptoed down the hall and peeked into the room where he had been playing with the girls. They weren't usually allowed to play in here, now Faramir knew why, but Bead had not been there and both Merry and Estella were busy so they had taken the opportunity that presented itself. Now Faramir wished they hadn't, and promised himself he would never disobey the adults like that again.

He snuck inside the room and looked over at the scene of the crime. A gasped when he saw the bowl, back up on the pedestal. It had been mended somehow, it was obvious that it had been in pieces before but at least it was still there. He couldn't understand what had happened.

"There you are" a voice said behind him.

Faramir spun around, and there was Merry standing in the doorway, leaned on a beam. He was smiling and his voice was no longer harsh and angry. Faramir looked at the bowl and then back at Merry again.

"It's unbroken!" he said.

"No not really" Merry said. "But we managed to piece it together, your father and I."

Faramir blushed heavily. He had forgotten that the Hobbit who had been there earlier was his father. How embarrassing to have made such a mess when he was visiting! Faramir had been intending on always impressing his father, not embarrassing himself.

Merry came over to him and tousled his curls.

"You must be starving" he said. "The rest of us have had afternoon tea already, but there are some cinnamon buns left for you. Just don't eat more than two, save room for dinner."

"I'm sorry I was bad and broke the bowl" Faramir said.

"It worked out in the end" Merry said. "But in the future, take a look at the bowl before you get into arguments or create a mess again. It's still there, but one can clearly see where it broke. It might serve as a good reminder for you."

Faramir nodded and gave Merry a hug. He felt a lot better now.

**XX  
XX**

The first day of 1435 was chilly and windy. Pippin and Merry took a stroll along the road between the Smials and the Hall, inspecting the Brandywine Bridge. The renovating would begin as soon as the weather improved. Right now it was too cold, the wind was bitter and crept right through all their thick layers of clothes, and the ground was rock hard. Not very good weather for working on a bridge.

"So almost half a year as Thain…" Merry said. "Do you feel adjusted yet?"

"Yes" Pippin said. "I miss having a Mistress of the Smials though. Someone to run the household while I'm working. I don't know enough about managing a home, years of bachelorhood at Crickhollow didn't really teach me much of value. And Mother is too old to be running things, my sisters have all moved out…"

"Uncle Paladin might have had a point, perhaps you should remarry" Merry said. "Don't hate me for suggesting it, it's just that you can't hire someone to run the Smials' household. They will only listen to the Mistress, and you don't have one."

"There has to be some other solution" Pippin said. "A promise is said for all time, and I promised never to love another."

"Then marry for practical reasons. It happens!"

"I can't do that! No, not when I've known what it's like to have a real marriage. Not to mention I cannot rob Diamond of her title even if she's not here to live it."

"It's your call" Merry said. "But I must remind you that Tuckburough is your primary concern at this point. And what's best for Tuckburough is not necessarily what's best for you, not always. Sometimes sacrifices need to be made."

"I have made sacrifices" Pippin said. "I'm not impossibly stubborn. Didn't I acknowledge the child, for one?"

"Are we still talking about **sacrifice**?"

"Merry by now you must know that I don't love him" Pippin said frankly. "I don't hate him, at least I think I don't, but I don't feel that he is my son. He's just… that child that I gave away, who will come back to the Smials and rule when I am gone. I feel more connected to my nieces and nephews than to that boy."

"No you don't fool me, you never have and you never will" Merry said. "I don't believe that you don't love him."

"It's not something that I'm proud to admit" Pippin said. "You're supposed to love your spawn but I feel nothing. What does that say about me, really? I wouldn't admit that to you if it wasn't even true, Merry."

"I still don't believe you. I think you might have yourself convinced but it's harder to convince me. Didn't you say that I understand you even when you don't understand yourself?"

"Yes but what makes you think you know me better in this matter?"

"Because once you've loved a family member you can't stop" Merry said.

"You're not paying attention" Pippin said, shaking his head. "I've never loved him. Never cared for him at all."

"Yes you have" Merry said.

"Oh how would you know?"

"I just need to look to myself. Any day now Estella is having our fourth child. The child has yet to be born but I love it. It's been that way with all my children, I've felt strongly attached to them while they've still been in the womb. You loved Faramir for nine months, then your stubborn heart closed its doors to him when he was born. Yet he already had one foot in, which was why you withdrew and tried to ignore him, hoping that he would go away. But he never will Peregrin. He never will."

"Merry I never cared for the baby when Diamond was pregnant."

Merry looked startled.

"You didn't?"

"No, not the slightest bit!"

"I know it can be odd to care for someone you haven't even seen, especially the first time when you can't really grasp that there's actually going to be a baby born, but…"

"No Merry, you don't understand. Try to follow me here. I felt dislike for the child she was carrying while she carried it. I didn't like her pregnancy, I didn't look forward to the birth. I wanted things to be the way they always had been, just she and I. Most of all I wanted her to be happy and she wasn't. Not at all."

"Pippin--"

"Merry she was miserable those entire nine months!" Pippin said and began to cry for the first time in a long time. "When she found out she was expecting she broke down and cried, I've never told anyone this before but she cried harder than I've ever seen anyone weep! She didn't think she was going to get to keep it, she never had before, and it was taking a huge toll on her. I swore to her that day that I would not get her in a delicate condition again, that she would never have to go through it again!"

"But Pippin, this time it went well."

"Well? Do you call her last months in life well? She was constantly ill, had those horrible itches, she swelled up in more places than I would have thought possible, couldn't sleep, barely eat… Diamond loved food!"

"I think you're remembering it worse than it really was."

"Trust me I remember everything as if it were yesterday" Pippin said. "It was the toughest months of her life! And then she died. It hurts me so bad just thinking about it! If only she could have been happy for those last months but she wasn't!"

"I think she was."

"I don't. I remember all I would wish for was that the baby would hurry up and be born so that she wouldn't have to feel so ill anymore. I wasn't particularly fond of the child, I just wanted her to be well, and I decided that I would never have another child for as long as I lived if it was to be this difficult for my wife. When she passed away I just couldn't bring myself to look at the baby, it had represented nothing but illness and unhappiness for me while she was pregnant and now she was dead and the baby was there instead. What was I to do?"

"You owed it to him to give him a chance" Merry said.

"All I wanted was my wife back. I couldn't care for the child, I just didn't have the strength. Nothing has changed since that day, I don't even feel like that kid is mine. Honestly Merry I don't care how much he's grown or what he's been learning, it doesn't affect me."

"It's been four years! How can you still be so resentful? You never used to carry a grudge."

"She meant everything to me. He means nothing to me. I would rather have held on to Diamond than have that child born into the world."

Merry shook his head, unable to understand where Pippin was coming from. He couldn't recognise his friend anymore.

"You know Peregrin, you ought to be thankful that Faramir was born" he said. "You act as if it's a burden, you've been given the greatest of gifts. Diamond gave that gift to you and you're discarding it like it were a foe. It's not a little orc Pippin, it is a young Hobbit, one who is part of you. You need to sit down and listen to your heart for a change, listen to what it tells you about love and not about grief. Listen to what it tells you about your son. You are his father, Pip. Parenting is a privilege, parenting is a calling."

"I've never felt any such calling" Pippin said. "Parenting is a **duty** Meriadoc, one we wouldn't have to have if we weren't born into the families in which we were. I can't raise the child here at the Smials when he has no mother, my duty to find a suitable home for him has been fulfilled. I've done my part."

"You never finish doing your part when it comes to your children" Merry said. "From the day they are born they become a duty which will last for as long as you live. You cannot overlook that."

"Merry honestly, part of me wishes I could have given him to some couple living as far from Tuckburough as the Shire boarders go and just forget that he was ever born. I never hesitated in asking you to take him in, but I didn't want to be forced to be around him. I left him with you because I knew he would be safe and cared for, not so that I could have my cake and eat it too. I don't want any part in his upbringing and the less I see of him the better."

"I think you're scared" Merry said. "I think you're scared of caring about him, simply because you made up your mind that you wouldn't. There is nothing wrong in loving him Pippin, no matter what happened to Diamond."

"I know you think I'm awful" Pippin said. "But--"

"I do not think that you're awful. Just that you need to wake up and remember that no matter what has happened you have a responsibility towards a little Hobbit boy."

"Yes I have. A responsibility to make sure he has the best life possible. So I gave him to you."

Pippin managed a slight smile. They reached the Brandywine Bridge and he ran his hand over the wood as they crossed it. He looked at his cousin and gave him a pat on the shoulder.

"Diamond would have approved of my choice" he said. "Stop worrying so much Merry. I claimed the child and he will have everything that is his by birth. Until that day he gets to be in a family, not with a lonesome father. He gets to be loved. Why do you object to that?"

"I don't. It's just--"

"Stop worrying so much, Merry" Pippin repeated and patted him on the shoulder. A smile appeared on his face. "We've spent every year since 1430 in grief and worry. It's time to put an end to all that. Now comes the better times, Master."

**XX  
XX**

Pippin was right. It did seem as if the new year brought better times. A week in to the new year Estella had her baby, a fourth daughter who was given the name Truce. Now that there were five children in the family Merry found he had less time on his hands to worry about he relationship between Faramir and his father. The boy was four and a half years old now and full of tricks and pranks, Merry and the now two nurses had their hands full keeping an eye on him. Merry found it nearly impossible to be mad at the lad, he reminded him so vividly of Pippin and the trouble he had gotten into when they were young.

Most days Merry got up early to go oversee the farming and make sure everything was working properly. Whenever had a day to spare he went out to the fields and helped out with whatever needed to be done. He wasn't much of a farmer, frankly he hated the feeling of dry dirt on his hands, but he knew they needed every hand they could get. After second breakfast he would go to his study and work there until afternoon tea. Then he usually had the rest of the day to himself, and he would often ride out to the Smials to see how things were there. It wouldn't be long now though before he would be spending his afternoons teaching Faramir. Dawn was not far behind, and after here came Meduselda and Summer, each child born the year after the next. Fortunately it would be years yet before Truce would join the group of students. Still there was no son in the Brandybuck family, whenever that child arrived Merry would have to start making serious plans for his future.

But during the spring of 1435 that future was still distant. Merry's favourite part of the day was the evenings, after supper, when the family would gather by the fireplace and tell stories, sing songs and just spent time together. Estella was very firm on each child being in bed by six in the evening but Merry would try to stall if he could. He loved holding them in his arms as they went to sleep, it made him feel completely relaxed and at peace.

Estella looked over at him with a smile on her lips one evening when Merry had won the battle and sat leaned back in his chair with Summer and Dawn asleep in his arms. The other children were tucked in already, they had all had a busy day playing in the woods and had barely been able to keep their eyes open. Estella took the opportunity to finish mending her favourite dress which had gotten torn a few weeks back. Looking at her husband and her daughters she had to admit it made a lovely picture.

"Perhaps we should get them into bed now" she suggested with a warm smile. "Busy day for both of them, busy one tomorrow as well."

"You're probably right" Merry sighed. "You take Summer, I've got Dawn." He rose carefully with Dawn in his arms while Estella took Summer. "Let's get these girls into bed… Lovely to have a family."

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Thanks for reading! Next chapter will be up shortly!

It's about time I find a better name for this story… Any suggestions?


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's note**: It's been a while since my last update, sorry. But here it is, the next instalment of this little series. I'm still trying to figure out a better name, so if you have any suggestions please give them to me!

**Disclaimer**: I own only the characters I've created.

**XXX  
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Merry snuck up under a tree and sat down. He leaned against the trunk and looked through his pack to find what he was looking for. He pulled out a book and opened it somewhere in the middle. After searching for a while he found the page he had last left off on and began to read. With his right hand he held the book and with his left he searched through his pack and pulled out a red apple which he began to chew on while he read. One of the first apples from this year's harvest. It tasted wonderfully; it was perfectly juicy and not mealy as red apples could sometimes be.

It was a warm day and the sun could almost burn anyone who dared stick their nose out in it, but the leaves of the tree provided a nice shade. The mild breeze was warm; it seemed to want to tell them that even though it was mid September summer had not yet given way to autumn. It didn't matter much to the Hobbits though, harvest was almost upon them and soon preparations had to be made for winter. The nice weather would not fool them for long.

Merry enjoyed his time alone underneath the tree. It was the calm before the storm; once harvesting began he would not have a moment to himself. He knew he should be in his study right now working, but it was such a lovely day and he had all winter to bury himself with work should it pile up on him right now. He was happy to have a moment alone without a workload; he did not get many of those anymore.

He finished his apple and tossed the leftovers as far away as the strength of his arm would let him. Gandalf had always frowned upon his habit of tossing his apple leftovers all around him but Merry always defended himself with that he was only planting new apple trees and making sure they were spread around the place. He reached into his pack and found another apple and munched away while he read.

Back at the Hall he knew he had things to do even outside the study. The five children were a handful; Truce had just begun to crawl and was everywhere all at once, Meduselda was jealous of her sister Summer and would cause a huge fuss over nothing as soon as her younger sister was involved, and Faramir was up to mischief most of the time with Dawn only too eager to go along with him. To top it all off Estella was with child again, this one due in March of the next year, and while it was still early she was not feeling well and had little energy. Good thing they had Bead and the second nanny, Thistle, to help her look after the litter.

While he sat there and read his book a pinecone suddenly landed on his shoulder. He gave the cone a puzzled look and glanced up at the tree. He was sitting beneath a birch; last he checked birches did not drop pinecones. He looked around but didn't see anything at first. Then another pinecone landed, this time on his book. He tossed the pinecone aside and shut his book closed. As he was about to get up a third pinecone hit him on the head. He could hear giggles coming from his right and with a frown walked off to the left.

He rounded a tree and once he was sure that the sender of the pinecones could not see him he went in a huge circle without making a sound or being seen, until he could spot the Hobbit with such a love of throwing pinecones. The Hobbit had walked out to the tree where Merry had left his book and his pack, and looked around with an unsure look on his face. Merry bent down and picked up a pinecone from a pile which was gathered beneath a tree.

The first one landed on the Hobbit's right shoulder and scared the target enough for him to let out a gasp. The second landed by his feet. Then an endless number of pinecones came flying, one at a time, each hitting precisely where Merry aimed. The poor target danced around and waved his arms, looking all around to see where the cones were coming from.

"Faaaaraaaaamiiiiiir…" Merry said in a creepy voice.

The lad froze. Merry stifled a giggle and tossed another pinecone.

"Faaaaaaraaamiiiiiiiir…"

Faramir backed up against the tree and gulped. He had heard stories of trees that could move and talk and who didn't appreciate it when you hurt them. Maybe the trees were mad at him for collecting pinecones and using them as harmless weapons! But when his name was called for the third time he recognised the voice. He stared in the direction the pinecones had come from.

"Merry?" he said, hoping the trees were not simply using Merry's voice to fool him.

"Noooooo…" came the answer. "It's the piiiiiinecoooooone aveeeeengeeeeer…"

"No it's not!"

Faramir rushed over to the bushes Merry was hiding in and with a war cry jumped the older Hobbit. They rolled around on the ground, wrestling playfully.

"You scared me!" Faramir cried.

"I cannot believe you were scared by that!" Merry said, roaring with laughter. "I was throwing **your** pinecones from **your** hideout! Fool of a Took!"

"It was not funny!" Faramir insisted.

"Oh yes it was" Merry laughed.

They wrestled around, Merry pretending that Faramir was the much stronger one, and they rolled around on the ground until Merry hit his head on the trunk of a tree. Faramir gasped and Merry rubbed his aching head, trying to catch his breath through the laughter.

"Are you alright?" Faramir asked.

"I'm just fine, my wooden head just longed for a companion" Merry chuckled and tousled the curls of the younger Hobbit sitting atop of him.

"I beat you!" Faramir said with a grin.

Merry responded by tickling him. Faramir cried out, he hated being tickled but Merry was in truth a whole lot stronger than he was. He squirmed and tried to get away but he didn't stand a chance against the much older Hobbit.

"You beat me, did you?" Merry said with a grin. "Who is winning now, huh?"

"I give!" Faramir shrieked. "I give, I give, I give!"

Merry stopped tickling him and stroke his cheek with his index finger. Faramir grinned at him, showing off a gap in his smile where the first baby tooth had fallen out. It was quite early, most Hobbit children lost their baby teeth between the ages six and ten, but Faramir's tooth had gotten the help of an inadvertent fist in the jaw by Meduselda two weeks back.

"Did I really manage to fool you?" Merry asked the boy. "Are you sure you didn't know it was me all along?"

"I thought it was the talking trees coming to get me!" Faramir said. "And they would take me to their woods and let me sit outside and freeze all winter long, and when the spring comes I would be covered in moss, and if someone walked by they would think I was a log!"

"Well you needn't worry" Merry said. "I won't let anything like that happen to you. In my arms you are always safe and warm."

"I know" Faramir grinned.

"Good."

"Because you're my Father."

"Laddie…" Merry said and his smile went away. "You know I'm not."

"But who are you if you're not my father?" Faramir asked. "Why does someone else get to be my father?"

Merry sat up and held Faramir by the arms. The child was straddled in his lap and returned the very serious look given to him. Merry had to chuckle.

"Don't you worry about that, young lad" he said. "The important thing is that you're safe and sound. How did you get out here anyway, I thought you were supposed to be inside with Thistle."

"Can I at least pretend that you're my father?" Faramir asked.

"Look, what do you say we forget all about fathers?" Merry asked. "Let's just be Faramir and Merry and know that I will always be there when you need me to be."

"Aye" Faramir said. "That sounds good."

"Good" Merry said and tousled his curls.

**XX  
XX**

October brought an unusual warmth, and the lovely weather prompted both Merry and Pippin to stall their workload. When the sun shone the brightest in the middle of the day neither of them had the energy to do more than lie around in the grass. They began going out for a longer walk every morning, then stopping for a few hours to eat and sleep under the hot sun before they walked back. A few days turned into a week and they began exploring parts of the Shire where they hadn't walked for years.

One day when Pippin was drifting off to sleep after a large meal out in the sun Merry brought back the subject neither of them had discussed for ten months.

"I think Faramir should move to the Great Smials."

Pippin sat up. His sleep was disturbed.

"Come again?"

"I think that it's time now."

"He's five, hardly old enough."

"It's been half a decade now" Merry said. "I want an end to this, once and for all. I can't keep doing this much longer. Estella can't keep doing this, our daughters can't keep doing this."

"Is he a burden?"

"Not at all. That is not wherein the problem lies. He has been asking about you, you know. Asking about his father. I know that he is still only a child but if you are to form a close bond with him and make the transition easier for him then now is the time, when he is still little. The older he gets the harder it will be."

"Nothing has changed" Pippin said and laid back down. He pulled his hat over his eyes to block out the sun. "Everything is still the same as the day I gave him to you."

"You are a powerful Hobbit, Pip lad" Merry said. "You have great authority. You can take him in and raise him even without a mother, use your power to bring your son home."

"They already think me queer, raising a child by myself is not going to help. How can I expect them to listen to me when I won't practice what I preach? I had a child in my study this summer, a two year-old lass whose mother had died. I found a new home for her, and her father said to me that it was comforting to know that I had shared that experience before and that I had shown everyone the right way."

"It is the right way" Merry agreed. "It is the right way when there are no lasses in the home to help raise the child. But you can make one of your sisters move back to the Smials. Or hire a nanny for him, there are several Hobbits living in the Smials who could do the job. Or you can remarry, I happen to know for a fact that Dilcey Boffin has carried a torch for you for some time now."

"Who?" Pippin asked. "Merry I can't marry someone for no good reason."

"Do it for your son. Is there a better reason than that?"

"A son which I don't love. Neither one of us would be happy with the arrangement."

"Pippin what about what's best for Faramir?"

"Listen Merry, I know I have recognised him as my son in front of the gathered Tooks" Pippin said and lifted his hat up to look at Merry. "But you are his guardian, not me. Why are you so persistent with this? Frankly I can't help but wonder why you're so anxious to get rid of him, he can't be good to have around if you're so desperate for me to take him in and move him out of your home."

"You're wrong" Merry said. "I love him Pippin, I love him like he were my own child."

"Yet you are so eager to get rid of him."

"It is not about what I want or what is best for me. What's best for me is to hold him close for the rest of his life and love him with all my might. But I have to think of what is best for **him**. I am not his father, no matter how much I wish that I were, **you** are and nobody else. What's best for Faramir is to be raised among the Tooks, and above all to have a real father. You don't know how important that is to him. He longs so much for a father to protect him and look after him and love him and it hurts him that he is with me and I'm not that person in his life. If he could just be with you and have a real father then he would be so much happier. I would not be able to let him go completely, Estella and I would still want to be in his life as much as possible, but he knows that we are not his real parents and he deserves to be with the one parent he has left. It would crush Estella and me if you took him back to the Smials but it would be what's best for Faramir. Putting ourselves first is a luxury which we don't have. And neither do you."

"For the last time **no**!" Pippin said and sat up. "**No**, no I won't take him in. Not for his sake, not for your sake, not for anybody's sake. If you ask me the best thing for any child is to let it stay where it feels at home, and from what I hear he feels at home with you. I gave up my access to the child, he is yours until the day I die and he becomes the new Thain. That's the way it's going to be and there will be no going back on that arrangement."

"I only agreed to take him in until you could provide for him" Merry said. "You can do that now, and then some."

"Financially, of course" Pippin said. "But what happens the first night he wakes up with a bad dream and cries out for a mother figure? I send him a nanny?"

"Won't you please just think about it?"

Pippin rose to his feet. Merry did the same and met his cousin's firm eyes.

"I gave him to you once before" Pippin said. "Now I'm doing it again. I'm giving you that child, to be raised by you as if he were your own, until the day comes when he has to step up and become Thain. From this day forward I shall not be that child's caretaker, I give him to you completely and in every aspect of the word, the only catch is that he inherits the Smials and not the Hall."

Merry looked into his cousin's eyes. Pippin did not budge. He reached out his elbow to Merry in an old Hobbit gesture of striking a deal.

"Will you take him?" he asked.

"I love him so much" Merry said. "All I want is to do right by him."

"I am **giving** him to you" Pippin said. "This time with no promises of it only being for a little while, this time I mean it for good and for real, no room for interpretation. What do you say, Meriadoc?"

With hesitation Merry reached out his elbow and let it touch Pippin's. The deal was sealed, just like it had been five years ago when Faramir had been an infant. Pippin nodded.

"From now on there will be no more urges that I bring him to the Smials. From this day forward you understand that you will raise him unto adulthood. This is the most important thing I have ever asked of anyone Meriadoc, and I could never ask anyone but you. It is the future of the Smials."

"It hurts me that I will never be his father."

"Nor will I."

Merry swallowed hard and rubbed his elbow as if he had burned it. Part of him wanted to be happy; it was comforting to know that he would never have to give the child up. He wanted to keep Faramir at the Hall and if it were only about Merry's feelings then he would have felt like he'd struck gold. But he could shake the horrible feeling that he had let the young Took down.

**XX  
XX**

October gave way to November and finally winter seemed to be on its way. Heavy rain fell each day, most Hobbits chose to stay indoors and those who did go outside often brought home a cold. Merry concealed himself inside Brandy Hall, never sticking his nose outside the door unless he had to. The long warm summer seemed far away, the weather had changed on the very day following the day Pippin had given Faramir to him for the second time. Merry took it as an alarming sign. For now Faramir was more than happy living with his Brandybuck family but Merry knew that the day would come when he would long to be among the Tooks.

While the rain feel outside the children were kept indoors and they became very restless. Merry felt he had no energy left over for unruly children but he had to step in more and more often, taking time off the work he had piled up, for Estella was not feeling well at all. She was having a difficult pregnancy, and with the memory of how Diamond's wearisome pregnancy had ended in the back of his mind Merry wished to ease her load as much as he could.

Bead and Thistle were helpful but it was getting expensive having both of them around. Merry decided on a new system where they worked a day each, which was just an excuse not to have to fire one of them. He found himself unusually cranky, the weather rubbed off on his mood and before long most Hobbits living at the Hall knew to keep their distance from both the Master and the Mistress.

But as November went along everybody seemed to get accustomed to the constant raining. His Hobbit nature prevented Merry from worrying about the future situation with Faramir for long, and he couldn't seem to worry about Estella for very long either. Either things would go well for her or they wouldn't, either way there was nothing to be done about it now. The baby would arrive in March, there was no getting around it, so he accepted the dangers that came along with it.

Once the mood lightened in their tunnels the Brandybuck family began to appreciate these days when they were forced to stay inside. Estella could tell the children stories for hours when she was resting, and when she needed a break Merry would bring out a book and read to them. Young Truce was potty-trained by now but she did not toddle around everywhere like her sisters had done at her age. She was still crawling and didn't seem very fond of doing that either. She was mostly content with sitting on a blanket with a few toys, seeming to listen to the stories at well. The rest of the children were unusually still and things were quiet at Brandy Hall.

One December day when the rain was coming down as usual Merry gathered the children around to hear a story before afternoon tea. Estella was lying on a couch wrapped in a blanket, caressing her six month pregnant belly with one hand and Faramir's head with the other, listening to the story with as much interest as the children. Truce sat still on her blanket and Meduselda was for once not angry with her little sister Summer. Merry sat leaned against a couch opposite Estella's, with one arm around Meduselda, the other around Dawn, and Summer curled up in his knee. He had just finished his story when there was a knock on the door and Pippin entered.

"Why Peregrin!" Estella said. "We haven't seen the likes of you for months! Come on in!"

"Thank you Estella" Pippin said and shook his cape to rid it off some of the water. "No, don't get up on my account."

"Let me just tell Bead we'll be another person for afternoon tea."

"No need to get up to do that!" Pippin assured her. "I ran into her in the hallway and she mumbled something about wolfing Tooks and how she'll make some more tea. I think it's already been taken care of. Am I interrupting something?"

"Of course not" Merry said and turned his head to look at his cousin. "Come on in, have a seat. What brings you by?"

"Don't mind if I do" Pippin said and sat down on the couch behind Merry. "I just came for some company. I've been up to my elbows in work lately, I figured nothing like a visit with the Brandybucks to brighten my rainy day and make me forget about work for a change. Especially since I realised that today is December 25th and that day is special to us both, my dear Merry of the Fellowship."

He lifted Summer up into his arms and she began to squeeze his wet curls, laughing when water ran down her hand and arm.

"You just missed an excellent story" Estella said. "Merry told one from memory for once, usually he reads us one from a book."

"An excellent story, you say?" Pippin said and shook his head so that water went flying everywhere, to Summer's great joy. "I bet he can't match the stories I have to tell! Great stories of dragons and of trolls and even about goblins!"

"No goblins!" Dawn cried. "I'm afraid of goblins!"

"How about a story about Elves then?" Pippin asked. "I happen to know an excellent story of an Elf named Fingol! Do you want to hear it?"

The children cheered and he began to tell them the story. He was fascinated by the child in his arms, he could see in Summer's face how lost she was in the story and how she hung at his every word. He had forgotten how much fun it was to tell a story to a child. He was glad he had come to Brandy Hall on this rainy day, and even gladder he had found all of them together like this. It felt good inside seeing these seven Hobbits together. It was a family that he saw.


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's note**: This chapter is a bit longer than the previous and covers more time. There might be some continuity errors in the middle, I wrote the first half and then nothing for a while, then I confused myself when I took it up again… But I hope it's nothing that will disturb the story. Uhm, and I know nothing about farming, so whatever errors occur there are because I don't have the time to research.

**Disclaimer**: You know the drill…

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Faramir looked up from his drawing and eyed the two adult Hobbits in the room. Estella was sitting on the floor, holding the newborn baby Lilac up in the air and playing with her; Merry was watching the two with a proud look on his face from his armchair by the bookshelf. There was no mistaking looking at the happy parents as they tended to the latest addition to their family. They were both very proud and very pleased with the child in Estella's arms, this newest bundle which had arrived only a few days ago on the second-last day of March.

Faramir swallowed. He didn't like the way it made him feel to watch Merry and Estella with the baby. For one thing he didn't appreciate another screamer with stinking diapers, the last one had just gotten to the age where he could accept them and now this one had arrived instead. Yet another girl in the house, as if there weren't enough already. But it was more than that. Looking at the parents and the baby made him feel like there was something missing. Not with them but with him.

He knew very well by now that he had not been delivered by the stork into Estella's waiting arms and that Merry had never smoked his special pipe weed in celebration of his arrival. He knew that he had not been proudly shown off as the Master's newborn child to all the habitants of Brandy Hall, who always came to ooooh and aaaah at the newborns. He knew that Estella and Merry were not his Mother and Father.

He wondered who his own mother and father were. Had his mother given him his first meal after the stork brought him, and had his father smoked foreign pipe weed in his honour? Had they shown him off to relatives with those proud faces? Had his mother held him up in the air and played with him while his father watched proudly? If so then why had they given him up? And if not, why wasn't he worth the glorious welcome which each Brandybuck daughter received?

He could feel a lump in his throat, and it didn't go away no matter how hard he tried to swallow. He was only five and a half years old but he knew that he was not like the other children around him. Lately he had been told by other children that he did not belong at the Hall, he was a Took and should live at the Smials. Faramir did not understand what that meant, he knew he was called Took sometimes but it did not mean anything to him. If the meaning of Took was that he didn't belong in his own home then he hated Took. He wanted someone to call him Brandybuck but no one ever did. They called Merry Brandybuck, and Estella and the girls. Many of the Hobbits living at Brandy Hall were called Brandybuck. But Faramir was different and did not get to be called that.

He didn't understand what the real deal was with mothers and fathers. He knew that the stork only brought babies to the mothers and that the father usually got very nervous about the whole thing but if this was where he was growing up then why had not the stork brought him to Estella? And where was the lass he had been brought to? He had met his father, although he never seemed to be able to remember his face, but he had never gotten to meet his mother. Where was she? Why wasn't he with her?

Though Faramir knew that being with his mother was not what he really wanted. What he wanted was for Estella to have lifted him up like that when he was just a few days old, and for Merry to have watched him the way he watched baby Lilac now. He tried to think that maybe Estella and Merry had been so taken by him that they had wanted him to live with them even though the stork had brought him elsewhere, but somehow he knew that was not true. He had heard people say that Merry only looked after him as a favour to his absent father. Faramir wanted it not to be true but hard as he tried he could not disregard the thought.

"I don't feel very well" he blurted out.

Immediately he got the attention of both Estella and Merry. The former held the baby close and rocked her and the latter leaned forward in his chair with a frown.

"Well what is the matter then, dear?" Estella asked with concern in her voice.

"It's my stomach" Faramir said. "And, and my throat."

"Your stomach and your throat?" Merry asked. "That's unusual."

"Mostly it's my stomach."

"Oh dear, we should perhaps get you to bed then" Estella said and looked at Merry.

"Yes, a little hot milk and then to bed" he said and got up from his seat. He kneeled by Faramir and placed a hand on his forehead. "You're not hot" he said. "Perhaps it's just been a long day."

Faramir put aside his crayons and his paper and rose to follow Merry. He stuck his hand in the older Hobbit's and felt how warm and secure it felt to have his tiny hand held by Merry's large one. Estella promised she would come by to look in on him as soon as Lilac was in her crib. Faramir wished Lilac was already in her crib and that Estella would hold him in his arms and rock him instead of the baby, the way she had done when he was younger.

Merry led him to the kitchen and lifted him up on a chair. Faramir watched the older Hobbit as he found some milk and began to heat it up. He wondered what his father was like and in what way it would be different to be taken care of him when he didn't feel very well. Somehow Faramir could not imagine any other lad than Merry making him some hot milk and tucking him in.

"When did you start feeling ill?" Merry asked and handed a cup of hot milk to the child.

"Just now… When we were in the sitting room…"

"Have you eaten anything you shouldn't have?"

Faramir shook his head and drank from the milk. Merry sat down opposite him and gave him a concerned look.

"Is there anything that you're nervous or sad about? Perhaps the arrival of the new baby?"

"New babies arrive all the time, I'm quite used to it" Faramir remarked.

"Yes I suppose they have been arriving quite often lately" Merry said and the hint of a smile crept across his face. "Maybe you're concerned that Estella and I will have less time for you now that we have another child."

Faramir shook his head. That was not it either. He waited to see if Merry would ask the right question but no more questions came and Faramir finished his milk in silence. He wondered how Merry could have known that he was not just having a regular stomach ache but that it felt like a knot in his stomach, a knot of anxiety. It felt comforting to know that there was someone who understood him and who knew him so well that he could tell the difference between a regular stomach ache and this. He wanted to stay near this Hobbit forever, this adult who knew him so well and made him feel so secure. He wanted this Hobbit to be his father.

When he had finished all of his milk Merry put him in bed and placed a rubber canteen filled with hot water on his stomach. He sat by the boy's side for a while, stroking his forehead gently. Faramir felt even more miserable than before and the knot in his stomach just wouldn't go away. He was afraid of being left alone yet he felt like he didn't belong here with Merry at this moment. He couldn't make the feeling go away.

"Are you feeling any better?" Merry asked.

Faramir shook his head violently. He was not feeling better at all.

"Merry? Where are my parents? Who are my parents?"

"You know who your parents are" Merry said. "You've met your father, remember? He comes to the Hall every now and then. And your mother is with my father, and with your grandfather."

"Why am I not with them? Why did not the stork bring me to you and Estella if you were going to take care of me?"

"Well you see… the stork cannot decide who the babies are brought to. Each child can only be given to one special mother. Nobody else."

"But why isn't she taking care of me? Why don't they want me to be with them? Why did they give me away?"

Merry looked away for a moment, wondering how to answer the questions. He came to the conclusion that it was better to tell the child the truth, he was old enough. He looked Faramir in the eye and took one of his hands.

"Faramir you are old enough to know the truth… about mothers and fathers and their babies. Once you know then you will understand why Estella and I are not your parents, why the stork could not bring you to us right away."

"Tell me" Faramir said.

"You see…" Merry paused. He had never expected it to be so difficult to explain the origins of life. "You know how Estella's tummy gets bigger? And then we have a new baby?"

"Yes?"

"The reason why her tummy grows is that the baby is there inside. It starts out teeny, tiny small and then it grows bigger until it's big enough to survive."

"But how does it get out of the tummy?"

Merry hesitated.

"The stork does the job, he has some magic. Either way that's not important, what's important is that our babies have all come from Estella's tummy, but you came from someone else. Her name was Diamond, remember how I told you about her?"

"Yes" Faramir said with a nod. "But where is she now?"

"Sometimes… sometimes the stork requires something in return for his work. Sometimes he exchanges the baby's life for the mother's. Your mother passed on when you were born, but it was not your fault. It just happens sometimes and there's nothing that can be done about it. When that happens someone else has to take care of the child since it needs a lass to care for it. When you were only a week old your father gave you to Estella and me so that you could have both a lad and a lass to care for you."

"Didn't my father want to keep me?"

"Your father knew that you needed someone to replace your mother" Merry said.

"What decides who the father is?" Faramir asked.

"The father is the one married to the mother."

Faramir thought about it for a moment. He looked at Merry, who could tell the boy had something else he needed to ask.

"How does the baby get inside the mommy to begin with?"

"Perhaps we ought to save that for another night" Merry said and quickly got up and tucked Faramir in. "Oh, and Faramir, don't tell the girls what we talked about. They're too little yet, this is only for grown children to know about."

Faramir nodded, proud to be old enough when the girls weren't. Merry leaned down and kissed his brow, then said goodnight and left him alone. Faramir thought about what he had been told. He thought he understood now why he could not call his guardians Mother and Father, but what he could not understand was difference it really had to make. He couldn't care less whose tummy he had come from, he wanted Estella to be his mother because she had nurtured him as one from his second week. And if Estella was his mother then that made Merry the father. Faramir didn't care that there was another lad out there who had been married to his real mother, in Faramir's mind fathers didn't have to have anything to do with the birth of babies. A father was something different to him. In the stories he had been told the fathers, if there were any, were always the ones who raised the hero and who protected him and cared for him. Faramir's definition of a father fitted Merry's role in his life to the letter, not that other Hobbit's.

He felt the knot in his stomach still. If only he didn't have to be so different. If only people would stop caring whether or not the stork had brought him to Brandy Hall. Dawn had been brought to Crickhollow just the same as Faramir, yet nobody treated her any differently. It was not fair.

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Merry leaned back against the headboard of his bed and watched as the nurse handed Lilac over to Estella to be burped. Thistle excused herself and left for her own chambers while Estella gently bounced the baby up and down. Lilac was difficult to burp and had an upset stomach. It was safe to assume Estella would be up more than once during the course of the night to soothe the baby. Merry couldn't help but frown when he saw how tired his wife was, the pregnancy had been difficult and now the baby was too. Perhaps it was time to wait for a while until they got pregnant again.

Lilac finally burped and Estella left the room to put her in the next-door nursery. Merry waited for her to return before he got under the covers. She sat down on the edge of the bed and he reached out his hands and rubbed her aching back for a little while. She then leaned back and pulled the covers over her, ready to fall asleep any second.

"Faramir was sound asleep when I looked in on him" she said through a yawn. "I think he will be feeling better tomorrow."

"I don't think he is ill at all, I think he had a stomach ache for other reasons" Merry said. "He asked me about his parents once I'd gotten him into bed."

"What did you tell him?"

"The truth. Where babies come from and how his mother died when the stork brought him."

"The stork? How does the stork fit into the picture?"

"I couldn't tell him **everything**! But I told him how his father couldn't take care of him so he left him with us."

"Why don't we adopt him Merry?" Estella asked. "We don't have a son of our own, from the looks of it we never might, and we're the only parents he knows."

"He is the Thain's heir" Merry said. "My best friend's child by blood. I cannot dishonour that bond by adopting him. That would be like pretending Pippin never had any part to play."

"Did he? From the moment of conception he seems to have stayed away."

"Not to mention it would mean denying Faramir what is his by right of birth" Merry continued, ignoring her comment. "And if we do have a son further down the line we would deny him what is **his** by right of birth."

"I just feel so bad for him every time one of the girls calls me Ma and I see that look on his face. Can't we at least allow him to call us Ma and Pa instead of by our given names?"

"We are not his parents by blood and since we cannot adopt him he must be aware of who his real parents are. It would only confuse him if we let him call us Ma and Pa."

"I think that boy is a lot more clever than you give him credit for" Estella said. "He knows the difference. It would just make him feel secure and above all **loved** if he could get to call us that."

"I've said no and that is my final word" Merry said. "Besides, those are just names anyway… Does it matter what he calls us? We care for him just the same no matter what name he uses."

"It matters to him" Estella said.

"We are his guardians, not his parents" Merry said. "It's perhaps harder for you to see."

"What does that mean?" Estella asked angrily.

"Nothing bad, simply that I lived with his real parents. I watched them together and I was there every step of the way. I can't take their parenthood away from them for my own benefit! He's Diamond's son Estella, not yours. Pippin's son, not mine."

"He is no more Pippin's son than Lilac is his daughter" Estella said and turned over on her side, facing away from Merry. "No matter what biology says. I'm with Faramir on this, parenting is not about blood it's about responsibility."

"I thought you were the one who said the responsible thing for Pippin to do was to give him up" Merry said.

"Listen to the words you just said… _Give him up_. He is no longer Pippin's child, he is yours, he gave him to you. And through you he gave him to me as well. I am that child's mother no matter who gave birth to him."

"If you feel that way then fine" Merry said. "But you will not allow him to call you anything other than Estella. That is an order."

Merry turned his back at her and tugged for some more of the covers. Did she not think he wanted them to be able to acknowledge Faramir as their own son? But Pippin had already claimed the child and no matter who raised him the best thing for Faramir was to remain Pippin's son, even if it was only by name. Merry had promised Pippin he would not try to get him to take the child back, but part of the promise had been to return the child when Faramir was old enough. He was not going to back down on either promise.

**XX  
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"Knock, knock!"

Merry looked up and waved Pippin in. He was busy writing a letter to be sent to their long legged friends, and he knew he had to hurry up because Pippin had come to collect it. It had been Pippin's idea to write and Merry had promised to have his contribution in by the end of the week.

"Almost finished!" he said.

"Out in the last minute, are we?" Pippin said and slumped down in a chair. "Really, that's not like you."

"It's been busy lately" Merry said and devoted his attention to the letter.

Pippin took a look around the room to have something to do while Merry finished his letter. He was a bit surprised that his cousin kept him waiting; it was not something that happened every day. Things were slow at the Great Smials so for some reason Pippin had assumed Brandy Hall would be slow as well.

"Not that I want to rush you…" Pippin said with a glance at the clock. "But I have to have the letters in by nine o'clock; the postman is riding for Bree during night to send the letters with a ranger in the morning."

"Almost finished…" Merry said.

Pippin nodded and absentmindedly wondered where everybody was. It was awfully quiet. Though considering that it was in the evening most of the children had probably been put to bed, and the adults were probably enjoying the silence in some sitting room. With a nice cup of tea. Pippin envied them, tea sounded just right.

"There" Merry said and signed the last letter. "Pass me the envelopes."

Quickly Merry sealed the letters and handed them to Pippin, happy to have done his part and be rid of it. Lately he had grown less and less fond of writing letters; it took up too much time that he needed to spend on other things.

"Stay for tea at least, won't you?" he said to Pippin who had put the letters in his bag.

"Well if you insist…"

Merry put aside his pen and paper and blew out the candle on the writing desk. He was happy to be done for the evening. It would have to be a quick cup of tea with Pippin, the children needed to be tucked in, but after that he could finally sit back and enjoy the evening.

Faramir came running through the door and stopped by Merry, tugging his arm with a grin.

"Hullo there" Merry said. "Are you ready for bed?"

Faramir nodded. Merry grinned and tousled his curls.

"You smell nice and clean" Merry said. "We took our baths this evening" he told Pippin.

"Saturday night baths are still common practice here at the Hall, I see" Pippin said.

"It works fine that way" Merry said and then turned to Faramir. "Don't go running up a sweat before we put you to bed, now."

Faramir shook his head. He wrapped his arms around Merry's neck and gave him a hug.

"I love you" he said.

"I love you too" Merry said and gave him a kiss. "Now run along and play, but nothing too wild alright?"

"Measure me!" Faramir urged.

"So that's why you came? You want to be measured?"

"Please!" Faramir said and tugged Merry's arm. "I think I might have grown from my bath!"

Merry laughed and got up.

"Alright then. Pippin, would you go get me a small knife please?"

Pippin obediently went and got the knife for Merry. He knew where Merry's parents had used to measure him and he figured not much had changed at Brandy Hall when it came to the children. He had to ask Bead which room belonged to Faramir, and when he found it he handed the knife to Merry and stayed by the door, leaning against the doorpost.

"Alright now…" Merry said, kneeling on the floor with Faramir who stood against the wall. "Here we go."

He made a small mark with the knife right above Faramir's head and scribbled the boy's age down to a month next to the marking. Faramir turned and looked. He had grown about a centimetre since the last time he was measured.

"You were right, you have grown" Merry said.

"Fantastic! Am I as tall as you were when you were me?"

Merry laughed.

"We can go to my old room and check later."

Faramir eyed Merry from top to toe with a frown.

"You are very tall and I am very short. Am I shorter than I'm supposed to be at my age?"

"I don't know" Merry said and turned to the boy's father. "How tall were you at this age, Pip?"

"I can't remember" Pippin muttered. "If the offer still stands for a cup of tea Merry I think I will take you up on it."

"Sure" Merry said. "Estella is in the dining room, she will be happy to help you."

Faramir gave Merry a funny look when Pippin disappeared. Merry leaned his head close to Faramir and whispered conspiringly to him.

"He is just cranky because you are taller than he was at six."

Faramir giggled.

"I am going to be just as tall as you are, Merry! Just you wait; I will be the tallest Hobbit in Brandy Hall before long!"

"Sure you will" Merry said. Then he looked sentimental. "Just don't grow up too fast, you hear? Cause then we'll lose you…"

"What do you mean?" Faramir asked.

Merry smiled again to cover his remark.

"Well one day you are going to be a full-grown Hobbit, my lad! And you won't want to be my little Faramir anymore. I don't expect to be able to cuddle with you and carry you on my shoulders and play with you when you're all grown up."

"Then I will stay a child forever" Faramir said. "I always want to be your little Faramir!"

"I'm glad to hear it" Merry said. "Now go get ready for bed. Estella and I will be in to check on you as soon as we've had our tea."

Faramir hurried off and Merry took the knife back to its place. Then he went to find Pippin, who had found Estella and the tea and was busy helping her eat the sponge cake she had baked earlier in the day. Merry strode up to him and harked. Pippin looked up at him with a grin.

"Hullo there" he said.

"Pippin what is the matter with you?" Merry asked. "What was that all about just now?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"You just taking off like that. Faramir must think you are not well."

Estella looked from one Hobbit to the other and decided it was best to take her leave. She excused herself and went to make sure Faramir got into bed properly.

"Listen Merry, I know what you were trying to do and I wish you would leave it be" Pippin said. "You could have gotten the knife on your own but you wanted me to watch while you measured his height because you think that someday I will cherish it. You are wrong. I also know you think that while I don't seem to appreciate being around the kid right now someday I will feel differently, and then I'll look back on days like today and be thankful for them. But you are wrong about that as well."

"You listen to me now, it was never part of any deal that you should treat him badly when you are around him" Merry said.

"I haven't done that!"

"Yes you have. I think we need to talk. But not here, too many ears around. Finish your tea, then meet me in my study."

Pippin watched him go and frowned. He was more tired of this old subject than he could say. He finished his tea and then went to Merry's study where his friend was seated at his desk with a sullen look on his face. Pippin closed the door and frowned, crossing his arms over his chest. Merry walked around his desk and sat down on it, crossing his arms and looking back at Pippin.

"What is this all about?" Pippin asked. "You know as well as I do I didn't treat him badly. There is something else bothering you."

"No in fact there isn't" Merry said. "It's just the way you look at him… He knows who you are and he expects some form of… emotion from you."

"One you know I cannot show" Pippin said. "One I do not feel. And before you give me another speech about parental love, take a step back and think for a moment. It has been six years. What do you think will have changed now?"

"Pippin… it's not about that. It's about something else. The way you look at him. You look at him like you are upset with him for some reason."

"He is the reason why my wife died" Pippin said.

"Please don't say that" Merry said. "Have you ever even believed that yourself?"

"Every day of his life."

"But why?"

"Why?" Pippin asked with genuine confusion. "Because Diamond died brining him into the world! If it weren't for him she would still be alive!"

"Still, I ask **why**. If you want to blame someone for what happened then how about starting with yourself?"

"Pardon?"

"It makes no sense blaming a child for the mother dying at the birth!" Merry said. "Faramir didn't ask to be born! He had no choice, no more than Diamond had a choice to have her baby! He did not magically appear Pippin; he came to be just like every other child. And if it hadn't been for **you** he would not have had to be born in the first place! He was conceived by **you** and once that happened there was no stopping the chain of events leading to Diamond's death. It was **you** who got Diamond pregnant and don't you blame Faramir for your actions! Face it Pip, you knew Diamond had problems keeping a child. You knew she had a hard time with it. You knew and yet you risked getting her pregnant again. Faramir did not do that. Faramir did not even **exist** until you made it so and by then the damage had already been done. If anybody killed Diamond then **you** did. Her husband. **Not** her son."

Pippin had a darker look on his face than Merry had ever seen before. He glared at his cousin through narrow eyes.

"Is that so?" he said.

"Yes."

"Well then I think you have said quite enough. I am through with your judgement and your speeches. And I won't listen to another word, not now, not ever. You and I have nothing more to say to one another."

Then he turned on his heel and left. Merry sank down on the floor with a deep sigh. He had not regretted a single word he said. He had wanted to say them for years now and Pippin sure needed to hear them. Merry was only concerned he might have gone a bit too far. What if Pippin did not return?

**XX  
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Estella put on her brightest smile and invited the old woman to come in and sit down. She didn't really have the time for this visit, but the woman was 119 years old and would not be much longer in the world and she had said she wanted to meet with the Master and his family before she died. It was an odd request in Estella's ears, but the woman had problems with her memory and according to her children she believed that the Master was in fact old Rorimac Brandybuck, a lad she had had a brief romance with as a tween... Estella had commented that the woman would figure things out when Rorimac was young while she was old, but her children had insisted that it didn't matter. And Merry had agreed to the odd meeting so Estella had no other choice but to put on a smile and pretend that she enjoyed the whole event.

"Old Rory…" the old woman said and put a hand on Merry's arm. "You haven't aged a day… How odd!"

"Mrs. Boffin…" Merry said gently. "I'm not Rory. I'm his grandson, Merry."

"Nonsense!" Mrs. Boffin said. "Don't you think I'd recognise you anywhere? Really Menegilda, you must tell him not to joke with an old woman this way."

"Estella" Estella corrected her.

"And this must be young Saradoc…" Mrs. Boffin said and grabbed Faramir by the cheeks to have a closer look.

"No Mother, this is Young Master Faramir" Mrs. Boffin's daughter Belba said.

"Faramir?" Mrs. Boffin said and raised an eyebrow. She turned to Merry. "I was so sure your son's name was Saradoc."

"Saradoc was my father, Mrs. Boffin" Merry patiently said.

Estella gently released Mrs. Boffin's grip of Faramir's cheeks and led her to a chair to sit down. Faramir rubbed his cheeks with a frown and sat down on the floor to help Dawn out with her small jigsaw puzzle.

"Can I get you anything to drink, Mrs. Boffin?" she asked.

"Please dear, call me Della."

"Perhaps some tea, Della?" Estella continued.

"No thank you Menegilda, I'm not in the mood for tea."

Estella gave Merry an annoyed glare, far from pleased with the visit, but put her best hostess face up for Belba Boffin and offered her something to drink as well.

"No thank you Mistress, we had tea with my sister just before we came over here" Belba said.

"Mistress…" Mrs. Boffin said with a scoff. "I could have been Mistress once…"

"Now Della" Merry said with his strict voice and kneeled by her chair to look her in the eye. "I don't want you talking of my wife that way, you hear? You know Menegilda came into the picture after you left it. And you were so much younger than old Rory, you know that too."

Mrs. Boffin muttered something under her breath. Merry gave her a pat on the arm and rose to put his arm around Estella. She firmly but discreetly pushed it away.

"Rory when did you go have all these children?" Mrs. Boffin asked and looked at the six children playing on the floor. "I can't remember you having so many! Where is young Merrimac? And who are all these girls?"

"These are my daughters" Merry patiently explained. "Merrimac is my uncle and he is dead. You know this. You were at his funeral six years ago, remember?"

Mrs. Boffin grabbed Merry by the arm and pulled him closer. Estella raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything. She lifted baby Lilac up in her arms from the crib she had been lying in and watched the scene without a word.

"Rory… It has been one hundred years today since you and I first kissed" Mrs. Boffin said.

"Mrs. Boffin, Della, I am not Rory" Merry said firmly. "I was not born until long after that happened. My father had not even been born when that happened!"

"Mother that is enough!" Belba said and untangled her mother's fingers from Merry's arm. "Perhaps it is time for us to go home now. Thank the Master and the Mistress for allowing us a visit in their private hall."

She helped her mother to her feet while apologising to Merry and Estella for her mother's behaviour. Merry assured her that it was no problem at all. Estella didn't say anything. On her way towards the door Mrs. Boffin stopped and eyed the children again.

"What a lovely bunch of children… You can tell the girls are sisters, they all look alike! The boy on the other hand… you couldn't even tell he was related to the others!"

Faramir looked away. Once Belba Boffin had left with her mother he got up and ran out, upset with what the old woman had said. Merry and Estella shared a look.

"Take the baby" Estella said and handed Lilac over to her father. "I will go talk to him."

She couldn't find him anywhere in their halls and began to wonder whether he had gone outside or if he was hiding somewhere. She went out into the windy day and found him standing underneath a tree, hiding his face against the trunk the same way Pippin tended to do when he was upset and wanted to be alone. Estella walked up to him and harked to make her presence known. He looked up at her but turned his head away again.

"Faramir…" she said. "You are not upset by what old Mrs. Boffin said, are you? You know she is very old and very confused. She thinks Merry is his grandfather and I'm his grandmother. Don't take what she says to your heart."

"You don't have to have memory to see that I don't look like the girls" Faramir said.

"And what does it matter that you don't?"

"It matters because everyone can see that I'm not a part of this family!"

"I don't look like Merry" Estella said and put her hand on his arm. "Yet we are family."

"But you both look like the girls" Faramir cried.

"Faramir… Family is not about how you look" Estella said. "We might look different but we are the same inside anyway, you know that. If that old woman thinks you are not part of our family then we both know that she is wrong. You cannot react this way laddie just because someone says you don't look like us. There are plenty of siblings by blood who look nothing alike, appearance is only skin deep. You must learn to think past that. You are family and you know it, you should just let everyone else's opinion fall flat without affecting you."

"It's not easy" Faramir said.

"Yes it is. You're so precious to us. You know this. It doesn't matter who your parents are. It has never matter to us! You've been ours since you were two weeks old. I know you are only a little boy still, but the sooner you come to realise that you're not any different to us because you don't look like us or you aren't the real brother to our daughters, the sooner you will stop being insecure and always be happy."

"I just don't want to be different at all" Faramir said through his tears.

"Being different is not always such a bad thing" Estella said. "You don't have that big nose Merry has, or my low hairline. Your inner qualities are no different from ours and that's the important part. Faramir don't mourn everything that you're not and embrace everything that you are. Trust me laddie, one day you'll be glad that you are you."

Faramir let go of his tree trunk and hugged his foster mother. Estella reminded herself to give Merry a good telling-off for ever inviting old Mrs. Boffin into their home, and gently shushed Faramir and rocked him back and forth. She could understand why he was upset but he was only six years old and shouldn't be concerned with these things yet. She felt Merry had made a mistake in trying so hard to bring Faramir back together with his birth father; it had made the boy feel insecure and unwanted. He had tried to do it without Faramir's knowledge but Estella knew the boy was aware. Merry would have to fix this.

**XX  
XX**

Faramir opened one eye and wondered who came this late at night to bother him. It was Merry, checking in to see if he had gone to sleep yet. Faramir opened his other eye and turned on his back to let Merry know he was awake. He had not been able to go to sleep after the long day, Mrs. Boffin's words still rang in his head although by and by Estella's were starting to win over them.

Merry came up to his bed and pulled out a chair. He put his candle down on its usual spot on the nightstand and gave Faramir half a smile.

"You were supposed to be asleep" he said.

"I'm not" Faramir said.

"I can see that… Listen Faramir… I know you feel insecure and that you wonder where you belong and why you are here with us and not with your parents."

"No" Faramir said. "I wonder how come you can't be my parents."

"You're probably wondering why I've been talking with your father so much in the past years about you going back to the Smials. It's not because I don't want you to be here! I just want what's best for you. And I thought that was for you to be with Peregrin."

"Are you sure?" Faramir asked. "Are you sure you wouldn't just rather not have me here? You have enough other children, you don't need me really."

"That doesn't matter" Merry said. "No matter how many children we have nobody can take your place. Believe me when I tell you that what **I** want is for you to be here. But I was trying to do what was **best** for you, even if it was not the same thing as what I wanted."

"I think this is best for me" Faramir said and yawned. "I don't want to go anywhere… I want to stay here… with my family."

"You are absolutely right" Merry said and kissed his brow. "I know that now. Now go to sleep and don't worry about this anymore."

**XX  
XX**

They didn't bring the subject up again. If Faramir was still bothered by it he didn't let it show. Estella and Merry avoided bringing it up since it seemed like everything was fine and soon they forgot about it. There were other things to worry about and other matters to tend to.

Eventually a boy was born, having six older sisters, and for a brief moment Estella worried that Faramir would once again doubt his place in the family now that there was another boy. However Faramir did not seem concerned, if anything he seemed glad to have a brother even if he was nine years older than the latest addition to the family.

The only thing that was not as it should was the relationship between Merry and Pippin. It had not recovered from their last argument and eventually Merry had to accept that Pippin didn't want him around much anymore. He knew he had tried several times to reach out a hand, now it was Pippin's turn to take some action. But Pippin stayed away, choosing to forget rather than to deal with and the two only saw each other in business matters. For a while Sam tried to be the meddler but after a while he resigned to Pippin's stubbornness and Merry's lacking energy to fix something which seemed to have been broken for years.

Meanwhile Faramir grew older, and when he was twelve Merry decided to bring him to the Smials when Pippin and Merry were supposed to have a meeting. Merry knew all three of Pippin's sisters would be there at the time and that they wanted to see their nephew. Not to mention it would be good for Faramir to get to spend time with his four cousins.

"Do you remember the Smials?" he asked Faramir as they approached the place which could have been the boy's home.

Faramir shook his head no. He had only been four years old the last time he came to the Smials, that was a long time ago. He was looking forward to seeing his aunts and cousins again, they came to see him every once in a while at the Hall but it had been a while now since they last got together.

Merry left him with his aunt Pearl when they arrived and went off to his meeting with Pippin. Pearl followed Faramir to the pasture where the cows grazed and left him with his cousins who were busy playing. Faramir opened the gate to the pasture and went inside where his cousins were waiting.

Inside Merry and Pippin went over some practical details concerning the Brandywine Bridge together with a group of Hobbits who were in charge of keeping the maintenance up. The tone was formal and efficient, anyone who didn't know the story between Merry and Pippin would have thought they worked together and nothing more. They were neither impolite nor friendly with each other. It was easier not to interact too much.

When the meeting was over Pippin sharpened his ears. He thought he could hear something outside which wasn't as it should. With a frown he put his things aside and went for the door. Merry followed him, now hearing the noise as well and wondering what was up. Perhaps the children were fighting, but it didn't sound like they were. It was a different sound.

When they came outside Pippin stopped so abruptly that Merry walked into him. It took Pippin two seconds to close his mouth and wake up from his startled freeze, Merry was a little slower.

"What in the name of Paladin the first?" Pippin exclaimed and hurried out on the yard.

Somehow the cows had gotten out of their pastures and appeared to have been spooked by something. They were all over the place, and Hobbits were everywhere trying to calm them down and bring them back to where they belonged. With an angry frown Pippin noticed two cows running out on the oat fields, risking a lot of damage to the crops.

Without wasting any time he ran off to move the cows before they did any permanent damage. Merry was more concerned with Faramir who was out somewhere playing. He couldn't see him but Pippin's sisters had come out to look for their children so they were probably in this area somewhere. The last thing they needed was someone being trampled, especially a child.

The whole debacle was over within a few minutes; the Tooks were efficient and had a way with animals, before long the cows were herded back to their proper place. Merry could hear Pippin ask with a roar how this had happened and then he spotted the children by the pastures. Pearl quickly herded them back towards the Smials and asked them what had happened.

"We were playing in a tree" Pimpernel's son said with a frightened voice.

"In a tree? I have never heard anything so stupid, Hobbits don't play in trees!" Pearl said.

"I fell out! And it scared the cows! They began to run towards the gate!"

"But the gate was closed, wasn't it?" Pearl said. "How did it open?"

"I must have not closed it properly" Faramir said with his head held low. "I was the last one to go inside."

Before he had time to say anything else Pippin came striding over, obviously furious, having heard the conversation. Merry was right behind him, hoping that his cousin would not be too mad with the children.

"You are **not** to play in the pastures, have I not told you so?" Pippin said to the children who all looked deeply ashamed. "There has been damage to the crops; the crops are what we live on, how could you be so reckless? And you," he said, turning to Faramir, "how could you be so careless as to not make sure you close the gate properly? Do you have any idea what you have done?"

"Pippin don't!" Merry said and stepped in between father and son. "It was an accident, yelling after the fact is not going to do anybody any good. They know they were wrong already."

"The boy cost us a lot of our oat crops!" Pippin said, still as angry.

"He is only a child" Merry said and felt Faramir sneak his hand into Merry's.

"Somebody could have been trampled and killed!" Pippin said. "Him being a child does not excuse that! I expect you to **raise** him, this behaviour is unacceptable!"

"Pippin we need to take a look at this little one's leg" Pearl said to divert his attention, kneeling by the child who had fallen from the tree. "You can be angry later."

"Take him inside, find the medic" Pippin said, heading back towards the fields. "I have to go see how much damage is done out in the fields."

"I'm sorry" Faramir said but Pippin either didn't hear or didn't care.

"What were you doing playing in the pastures, I thought you knew to stay on the other side of the fence" Pearl said to the children and lifted up the one with the injured leg.

"Your father scares me" one of the children said to Faramir.

Merry could feel Faramir squeeze his hand tight. Merry felt a bit torn in the issue, he fully understood Pippin's anger but it didn't seem right to take it out on the children. They knew what they had done wrong already.

"He has his full right to be mad" Pearl said. "The crops are important. If they have been damaged we might have to starve this winter. Come inside now, you are all done playing outdoors."

"I'm going to take Faramir home" Merry told her. "We are done here anyway. Tell Pippin we will make up for the damage. Our harvest seems to be rich this year."

Pearl nodded and gave Faramir a wave goodbye. Merry looked out to the fields while they waited for their pony, and wondered how bad the damage was.

**XX  
XX**

The next day Merry took the three oldest children out to practice shooting with a bow and arrow. It was a skill he had never quite mastered himself but some Hobbits hunted with this weapon and it couldn't hurt to teach the children.

Estella came by and watched with a frown. Merry was instructing Meduselda while Faramir and Dawn looked on. It was hardly a skill Estella felt her daughters needed to have; she could not understand why Merry insisted on training the girls.

"Merry my dear, you have a lot to learn about raising girls" she commented.

"Say what?" Merry said and looked up.

"Little girls need to learn crocheting, and cooking, and other skills like that. They hardly need to learn how to fire a bow and arrow."

"There's no good reason why they can't learn if they want to" Merry said. "I happen to know a woman who fights with a sword as good as any man, or better. Our girls can do whatever they want, same as the boys."

"But when will they **need** it?" Estella asked.

"It doesn't matter" Merry said and watched Meduselda fire her arrow and miss the target completely. "The point is that they can if they want to."

"Out of all your oddities…" Estella sighed. "If you ask me you just don't know how to raise a girl so you raise them as boys. Perhaps you should leave their upbringing to me and focus on Faramir and Rohy?"

"I will raise them as best I please!" Merry said, sounding offended.

"Fine" Estella said and laughed. "One male skill per daughter. Nothing more! I want them inside by the end of the hour; there is work to do in the kitchen."

"What's for dinner?" Dawn asked.

"Nothing if you don't help me out" Estella said with a smirk.

"We don't want to risk that!" Merry said. "Alright Estella, I give. One skill per daughter! And I'll have them inside by the end of the hour."

Faramir watched Estella go and his mind drifted back to something Pippin had said the previous day. Faramir shuddered when he thought of it.

"Merry?" he said.

"Yes what is it?"

"Do I have to go back to the Smials?"

Merry looked up with a surprised expression on his face.

"You will live there when you are older. But if you're asking if you have to go back there anytime soon then I guess not."

"Good" Faramir said. The last thing he wanted was to go back there and face the justified anger of the Thain.

Merry was about to say something but changed his mind. Instead he turned his attention back to Meduselda who was having all the trouble in the world with the bow and was getting more and more annoyed by the minute. Faramir looked on as Merry patiently tried to teach her how to hold the bow and aim but it was obvious that he was not skilled enough in the art to be able to teach it properly to someone else.

Faramir wished he could freeze this moment in time and stay there forever. If only he never had to grow up. If only he never had to face who he was.


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note**: This chapter is a bit uneven since I wrote it on two separate occasions, weeks apart. Hopefully it works anyhow. It jumps forward in time quite a bit, sort of the next phase of the story. Earlier on it was a lot about Merry's standpoint but now it changes to focus mainly on Faramir.

**Disclaimer**: The usual…

**XXX  
XXX  
XXX**

Faramir passed through the gates together with Dawn and halted his pony. Dawn stopped beside him and gave him a look. She couldn't quite tell what he was thinking; the look on his face was remarkably free of emotion. It was the first time either of them visited Crickhollow since they had moved to Brandy Hall twenty-eight years earlier and it seemed like a lifetime had passed since then. They had both been born here and spent their first years here but that had been a long time ago. Faramir was 30 years old, Dawn 29. Raised as brother and sister even though they in truth were second cousins. Neither of them had given a thought to Crickhollow for many, many years until recently when Dawn had passed by it when she was out riding. She and Faramir had decided they wanted to stop by and see what their old home was like.

Faramir dismounted his pony and led it towards three poles sticking out of the ground and tied the pony to one of them. Dawn remained mounted and watched him sit down on the grass and look at the house. It was odd to think that they had lived here once, neither of them had any memories of it. Dawn was mostly there because she thought it would be fun to see it, but she had a feeling it meant more to Faramir than that. Even though he denied it he had always seemed to put great weight in matters concerning his heritage and first months of life, being back at Crickhollow was surely more emotional to him than to Dawn.

"Come on Dawn" he said and got up on his feet. "We came here to look, didn't we? Let's go look inside!"

He went up to the door but to his surprise found it locked. That was highly unusual and not something he was prepared for at all. He turned and looked at Dawn who fished out a key from her pocket and tried it out.

"How did you know it was going to be locked?" he asked.

"These old houses are all locked" Dawn said. "It keeps Hobbits from coming in and taking things they don't assume anybody's using anymore. Every now and then Crickhollow is lent out to guests and when it is everything needs to be here."

"I didn't know that" Faramir said and followed her inside once she got the door open. "I thought this house hadn't been used since we were little!"

"It was used just last month."

"I guess it won't look anything like it did back when we lived here then" Faramir said with a sigh. "Too bad."

"No I don't think they've changed anything" Dawn said and looked around in the room they were standing. "They usually don't. I'm going to go have a look around, are you coming?"

"You go ahead, I'll catch up" Faramir said.

"Fine…" Dawn said, giving him an odd look, and went down one of the halls to see what she would find.

Faramir sat down on the nearest chair and took a good look around. It felt so strange to be here. He had forgotten all about Crickhollow and that he'd ever lived there, it was so long ago. He couldn't understand how he could have just forgotten about Crickhollow, he was keen on learning more about his childhood and his heritage. He knew he had not been raised by his parents. And he knew his mother was dead and who his father was. But that was about it. He had no knowledge of why he had not been raised among the Tooks or how anything had played out during those critical first weeks of his life. He had never felt that it would make a difference in his life knowing about it, he was content with his childhood and the people who had raised him, but he was a curious nature and it frustrated him that there were parts of his own life that he knew nothing about.

But this had been his home. He had been born here and lived here for two years. And it suddenly occurred to him that his parents had lived here. Of course he had always known in the back of his head but it had never been real to him. Not until now, at least.

Slowly he made his way down one of the halls. One thing he did remember was Merry talking about the living arrangements, which hall was the Took's and which one was the Brandybuck's. He went down the hall that had belonged to Pippin and Diamond Took and opened every door he passed by to peek inside. There were only five rooms, and the first two turned out to be single bedrooms and those he discarded at once. But the third room was a larger bedroom with a bigger bed, most likely where his parents had slept. He stepped inside and closed the door, hoping to be alone for a while. It was odd that he didn't feel anything being in this room, no sense of connection or recall, it was just another room to him. It didn't tell him anything about the people who had lived there and it didn't seem to hold any part of them still.

He sat down on the bed and waited to feel something. Not feeling anything was worse than anything he might have felt, he wanted so badly for his past to mean something to him but somehow it didn't seem like it did.

"Who were these people?" he wondered out loud. "And why can't I seem to care?"

His eyes fell on a tiny book lying on one of the bedside tables. He rose and picked it up, wondering who had left it there. He opened it to see if there was a name somewhere, but found it to be someone's diary. He found the last entry and saw that it was dated a month earlier. Whoever had borrowed this house had forgotten it there. For some reason it bugged him that someone had been using this room, and for a moment he felt it suited them right that they forgot their diary.

He jumped slightly when Dawn entered the room. She had surprised him. She gave him a funny look and then apologised for having startled him.

"I have looked down the halls where Ma and Pa used to live… Do you want to see it or should we get going? We have chores to return to."

"I think I'll pass" Faramir said.

"What's that in your hand?"

"Somebody left their diary behind when they stayed here" Faramir said. "I'll take it back to the Hall and leave it with Merry, he ought to know who lived here last."

Dawn nodded and went outside to fetch the ponies. Faramir put the diary in his pocket and felt a slight sting of disappointment. For a brief moment he had thought that he had found his mother's diary. But logic told him that it would not still be lying around after thirty years. His father had probably brought it with him to the Smials, if there had even been one. But Faramir wished he had gotten a chance to see it.

**XX  
XX**

"I found this at Crickhollow" Faramir said and handed the diary over to Merry. "Who was it that stayed there last?"

"It was some of Sam's children" Merry said and glanced through the diary to find a name. "This diary appears to belong to Daisy. I had better return it before she misses it."

Faramir wanted to ask what Sam's children had been doing sleeping in one of the old master bedrooms, but bit his tongue. There was a total of eight beds at Crickhollow, naturally the master bedrooms would be used if that many people came to stay. And for some reason Faramir didn't want Merry to know that it bothered him.

"Where did you find it?" Merry asked.

"I think it was the master bedroom… in the Took hall."

"I see."

Faramir hesitated.

"For a moment I… For a moment I almost thought it had belonged to someone else."

"Who?"

Faramir looked away. He knew very well that Merry understood who he had thought it belonged to, and he wanted him to say it out loud. But when nothing was said by Faramir Merry shrugged his shoulders and put the diary aside for now.

"There was a diary, if I recall" Merry said. "At least at one time, but I don't think she wrote constantly. I always assumed Pippin brought it with him when he left for the Smials. He left most of her things behind, but I thought he wouldn't want her private thoughts to lie around for anyone to study."

**XX  
XX**

The following afternoon Faramir returned to Crickhollow. Merry had given him an idea, whether he meant to or not, and he had to follow up on it. The key to the house was in his pocket, Faramir knew Merry was aware that it had not been returned, which made him even more convinced that he was being pushed in the right direction secretly.

He went down the old Took hall and passed the three bedrooms. The fourth room turned out to be a sitting room, not what Faramir had been looking for. He tried the fifth door but it wouldn't open. Surprised he pulled the handle a bit harder. It must have rusted, there was no reason why the door wouldn't open otherwise. But it was securely closed and would not come open. Faramir tried the key, but it didn't work either. It wouldn't even fit inside the lock!

Faramir knew there was only a very small window to that room to let in some sun, far too small for a grown Hobbit to climb through. If he wanted to get inside he would have to pass through the door, and he desperately wanted to see what was on the other side of it. The fact that it was locked only made him more sure that there was something important there. If he was right in his guesses it was the study. Merry's choice of words the day before had led him to believe that perhaps some things had been left behind here, and he was becoming more and more sure of it by the minute.

Finally he decided to break the door down. He was quite strong, but the door seemed awfully solid. He gave it a hard push, feeling a burning pain in his shoulder, but to no avail. However he couldn't give up now, and he pushed it again, as hard as he could. And then once more. The door was too thick and solid, it would not come open. But suddenly he heard a cracking noise and noticed that the wood was withered after all these years. Perhaps it would come open after all!

He needed something stronger to break down the door, his shoulder was about to come off, or so it felt. He found a solid chest in the sitting room and used it as a ram. After two tries the door gave way and a cloud of dust welcomed Faramir inside the study. Coughing and sputtering he sat down the chest and walked inside.

The room was dark and the air felt thick. It had not been breathed for thirty years. He lit a candle and began to search through the room. It gave him the chills being inside this room where nobody had set foot for three decades. It was indeed a study, but to Faramir's great surprise there was not much in it. The shelves were all emptied and the desk had nothing on it. The only place he could find something was in the desk drawers. He searched through them without finding anything.

He looked up and sighed. This made no sense at all to him. If there wasn't anything special inside the study, why would it have been so carefully locked? The key Faramir had had not even been able to go inside the lock, Faramir assumed whoever had locked the door wanted it kept locked and had broken off the key from the inside. Then it occurred to him that it was impossible. Whoever would have done that would have been trapped in here forever, for there was no way out. He rose and walked over to the door and found that the lock had indeed rusted up.

Faramir felt ready to give up. There was nothing of value in here at all, he had wasted his time. But the door had been locked, he couldn't give up the notion that there must be something in there for him to find. He searched through the drawers again, as carefully as he could, and suddenly noticed that the bottom of one of them could be pulled upward. He pulled the bottom up and found nothing. Obviously one could hide something there if one wanted to, but there was nothing there. Filled with frustration he threw the piece he had removed on the floor and sat down on the chair.

Then he suddenly paused. Hadn't he heard a strange noise when the wooden piece hit the floor? He bent over and picked it up, and found a small key glued to the wooden piece. With a lot of effort he managed to get it loose, and filled with triumph held it up. Then the feeling of victory passed as quickly as it had come. What good would a key do him? A key to what?

He gave up and decided to go back home and ask Merry about it. If he didn't know then nobody would. On his way out he stopped by the broken door and wondered what Merry would say about it. He picked up the chest and carried it back to the sitting room, not noticing until he put it down that it had a lock on it. The size of the lock seemed to fit the key, and with a sudden flash of hope he tried out the key he had found. The chest opened.

Inside there was two dresses which he assumed had belonged to his mother, a tin mug and a box. Faramir lifted the box up and opened it. Inside he found a number of letters and what hopefully was a diary!

He opened the diary and began to read. It didn't occur to him that perhaps he shouldn't, if this was indeed Diamond Took's diary then she had been dead for too long to care, and it was his own mother's diary anyways. He felt he had a right to it. He read the first entry and quickly found that the diary belonged to someone else. But something had caught his interest and he couldn't help but read the entry to the end. He couldn't believe his eyes.

**XX  
XX**

"Truce put that away and go wash up for dinner!" Estella commanded and parked Lilac in her chair. "We don't want to be waiting for you!"

Dinner time was always chaotic at the Hall, and this day seemed to be worse than normal. Estella counted to six children and one husband, meaning that two children were running late. There was never any telling whether they would be eating at home or someplace else but Estella always felt they needed to wait at least fifteen minutes for everyone to arrive.

"Violet there you are!" she said when her youngest daughter arrived, looking like she hadn't seen a meal in weeks even though she had had more than anyone else to eat at afternoon tea. "Did you wash up? Good, sit down."

Merry glanced at the clock and wondered how long it would be before they would get to eat. He was starving. After fifteen minutes Estella decided they had waited long enough and ordered the food to be brought out. They had barely begun to eat when the eighth child appeared.

"Faramir, we were beginning without you!" Estella said. "You're late dear. Sit down."

"I don't want any dinner" Faramir said.

Merry and Estella shared a look.

"Are you sure?" Estella had to ask.

"I'm not hungry. I want to speak with you!"

"You will have to wait darling, you may not be hungry but I am" Estella said. "You might as well have some food while you wait."

"I need to talk to **both** of you. Merry in particular."

"You will get to talk to us, but you have to wait" Merry said and ignored the impatient look on Faramir's face.

"I mean I have to speak with you **now**!"

"And I'm saying you have to wait!" Merry said firmly. "Either sit down and wait here or go wait in my study, but don't take that tone of voice with me! We will have our dinner and then we can talk."

Faramir looked ready to make a rude reply but realised it wasn't going to get him anywhere. He snatched a bread from the table and stormed off to the study. Estella and Merry looked at each other with confusion.

"What was all that about?" Estella asked.

"I have no idea" Merry said.

**XX  
XX**

Faramir impatiently paced back and forth in the study until Merry and Estella had finally finished their meal and came to talk. Estella closed the door behind them and Merry crossed his arm with a slight frown.

"Now what is so important that you need to barge in late for dinner and demand us to leave our meals to talk?"

"I went to Crickhollow today" Faramir said.

"Crickhollow is locked, you broke in?"

"I took the key from Dawn! I was looking for something that might have belonged to my mother, a diary!"

"The one you asked me about? Like I said, I don't even know for sure that she kept one all her life. And it might be at the Smials, it's more likely that Pippin took it with him."

"I went inside the study and I found a key to a chest. Inside there was a diary, but not my mother's diary! Somebody else's!"

"Both studies are kept locked, we don't want visitors snooping about."

"It's not locked now" Faramir said. "I found your diary Merry, and I read it!"

"Is that so?" Merry said. "What business did you have going through my private diary?"

"I thought it belonged to my mother! But when I found out that it didn't I also found something else out! How could you have kept that from me?"

"Kept what?" Estella asked.

"It couldn't have been my diary" Merry said, changing pace. "What would my diary be doing in Pippin's chest? I never went near that thing! Besides I only kept a diary for a few months and that diary is…"

"You misplaced it" Estella recalled.

"It's in the chest" Faramir said. "Don't ask me why, but it's there. Along with letters that my mother wrote to my father before they were married, and some knickknacks. But you're not answering my question!"

"I don't think you are in any place to be asking questions" Merry said. "You had no right to go through my private things, nor your parents' private things for that matter, and I am not discussing anything with you at the moment! You are still underage and you will do as you are told, right now that is spending the rest of the evening and the three following days in your room! Faramir you know better than to go through someone's private things!"

"Because you taught me better than that?" Faramir asked.

"What are you getting at?" Estella asked.

"I will not let this matter be swept under the carpet over some mistake **I** made, seeing as how that mistake was the only chance for me to find out the truth! The truth that you have kept from me all these years!"

"What truth, what are you talking about?"

"They didn't want me!" Faramir said. "You said so in the diary! My mother didn't want me, you saw how sad she was! My father refused to even see me, wanting no part at all in my life! And you felt you had no choice but to take me in, though you were far from willing! Nobody wanted me! You spent a lot of time and effort trying to make my father take me back but he refused! You were stuck with me, you both were!"

"Faramir that--"

"You have lied to me my whole life! And my father was not the great Hobbit you always told me he was Merry! He was not a hero, he did not have great adventures, he was not special! He was a coward, completely heartless! Nothing you told me about him was true!"

"Do not judge people when you know nothing of what you speak" Merry said.

"I know **exactly** of what I speak! It's all there in your diary!"

"Darling listen for a moment…" Estella began, but Faramir shook his head.

"I don't want to hear it" he said, going for the door. "I've heard enough out of you two! Let me be alone!"

Merry and Estella let him leave and then looked at each other yet again with confused eyes.

"I… don't even know what to say" Merry said.

"What did you write in that diary?" Estella wanted to know.

"I wrote… I can't even remember what I wrote! But I think I wrote a lot about how I was trying to get Pippin to come around and see Faramir. And yes, I wrote that I didn't want to take care of him. But not for the reasons Faramir thinks…"

"You had better sort this out" Estella said. "Give him some room to calm down and then talk to him. I am going to talk to him right this minute, whatever you wrote in that diary I can look him in the eye and tell him that he did not read anything about my standpoint! I won't let him dismiss me because he is mad at you and Pippin, he needs to know someone felt differently."

Estella hurried out into the hallway and nearly collided with Summer.

"What is going on?" Summer asked.

"Not now, I have to speak with Faramir."

"Faramir left" Summer said.

"He said he was headed for his room!"

"He said to Dawn that he's leaving. Going out riding probably. He'll be back shortly, don't fret!"

Merry appeared in the doorway and looked troubled. He didn't like Faramir riding off like that, he hoped he wasn't headed to see Pippin. That confrontation was one they would all benefit from letting pass. There were some parts of Faramir which unmistakably came from Pippin, his stubbornness being one of them. If the two of them butted heads things might not go well, especially after all these years.

**XX  
XX**

"Merry I am worried" Estella said as she came into their bedroom with a candle in her hand. "It's late and Faramir is not yet back!"

"I had Rohy ride over to the Smials a while ago to see if he was there" Merry said. "They haven't seen him. That's good news."

"Good news? How so?"

"That means he hasn't gone to confront his father."

"About time Peregrin had to own up to his actions, if you ask me" Estella said. "But never mind that, I don't think I can go to sleep knowing that he can be anywhere!"

"Anywhere indeed" Merry said. "He has a number of friends that he might have visited and where he might be spending the night. He could be at Crickhollow. He could even have gone as far as Bag End for all we know. Estella he is thirty years old he can take care of himself. When his father was twenty-eight he--"

"I don't want to hear about that!" Estella said. "I want to know where he is before I can rest peacefully!"

"Just go to sleep, love…" Merry said and snuffed out the light on his nightstand. "Faramir is safe. There is nothing we can do to find him right now anyways, and you're not doing anybody any favours by tossing and turning all night. Now go to sleep."

**XX  
XX**

Faramir was curled up in an armchair, staring at the fireplace without seeing the flames. Sam handed him a cup of hot broth and sat down on the chair next to him.

"Drink this" he said. "You have to come to terms with this sooner or later and there's no time like the present."

"I don't want anything to drink" Faramir said, ignoring Sam's continuation.

"If nothing else you ought to take care of yourself so that you don't fall ill, we have enough Hobbits to look after as it is" Sam said.

Obediently Faramir sipped his broth. Sam looked at him and felt sorry for him. Faramir had told him briefly what had happened and why he needed someplace to stay for a few days. Sam had always suspected that things would fall down over them sooner or later, things concerning this little Hobbit's life had been too complicated all along to be kept a secret.

"I know your father well, and I know Merry" Sam said. "And I won't have you sitting here hating them or wishing bad things upon them, for they are dear friends to me. But I can understand your heartache."

"Sam you don't know what it's like to find out nobody ever wanted you" Faramir said. "That you were just a burden wherever you came. That if those closest to you had gotten to decide you would never have been born!"

"You're just as stupid as your father" Sam sighed.

"Pardon me?"

"And just as prone to self pity! Have you not had a good raising? Have you not been warm and protected? Have you not been cared for?"

"Well yes, but--"

"No but!" Sam said. "You have nothing to cry about in that matter. Can you blame Merry for hesitating to take you in? You were his best friend's baby, he was not even married when you were born! He had no idea what his fiancée would even say about it! Asking someone to raise someone else's baby just after you've asked them to be your wife is not the easiest thing in the world!"

"It's not just that he hesitated to take care of me" Faramir said. "It's that he tried to have me moved back to the Smials!"

"All those years to no good" Sam said.

"Years?" Faramir echoed. "It went on for **years**?"

"I…" Sam said, not knowing what to respond. He thought Faramir knew.

"Talk to me Sam!"

"I think you were around eight or nine when he stopped trying" Sam admitted. "Sometime before Violet was born. But--"

"Nine years" Faramir said. "Goodness…"

"He only wanted what was best for you" Sam said. "To be with your own kin. You're not a Brandybuck, you don't belong with them and you're not going to live with them all your life. He thought you had more use of your father than of him."

"But nine whole years…"

"Let me ask you something" Sam said. "Do you believe that Merry and Estella don't care for you as much as you used to think? Did you ever get a chance to doubt when you were younger?"

"Not really, no."

"And why do you care about the love of a Hobbit you've hardly ever met? What difference does it make if your father cares about you? Who is he in your life?"

"He was a hero" Faramir said. "Merry always used to tell me stories of how heroic my father was. He painted this picture of someone I could be proud to have descended from. That Hobbit doesn't exist."

"You're right, he doesn't. But he did once."

"And then I came."

"No, then he… He changed. But there is a lot of good in him still."

Faramir looked down in his mug and wished the answer to all his problems floated there. He wasn't sure of what to do. All he knew was that he couldn't face Merry or Estella for a while. He didn't know what hurt more, losing the father and mother he thought he had or losing those who had raised him. He almost wished he had never found the diary.

**XX  
XX**

Three nights later Merry woke with a start when Faramir gently tapped him on the shoulder. Merry's bolt in the bed woke Estella who squinted in the darkness and lit a candle.

"What is wrong?" she asked.

"I'm sorry Estella I didn't mean to wake you too" Faramir said.

"Faramir?"

Estella and Merry both sat up in bed. Faramir was slumped in a chair by Merry's bedside and looked a bit ashamed of having woken them both up. Estella got out of the bed, pulled her robe around her and gave Faramir a big hug.

"Where have you been, I have worried sick!"

"I stayed with Sam at Bag End" Faramir said. "I didn't mean to wake you Estella, I just…"

"You wanted to speak with me?" Merry guessed and got out of bed as well. "It's the middle of the night, laddie…"

"Actually I… At first I just wanted to see if you were awake and let you know that I was back, then I watched you both sleep and… I was going to go to bed but I decided that I did want to talk."

"Then talk" Merry said and lit another candle. "I need to talk to you as well. Things went wrong when last we saw each other."

"I know" Faramir said. "I've been thinking about it a lot. Really hurting over it. But I knew I had to come home someday and I wanted to sort some matters out. But when I saw the two of you I just couldn't be mad anymore. It occurred to me that… that you have always been there for me. All my life. You let me be a part of your family, and even though you didn't want me to begin with I know that you love me now."

"Sweetheart we've loved you since you were a baby" Estella said, still holding him.

"Indeed we have" Merry said. "Faramir how much do you really think you can tell from just a diary? Do you really believe your own judgement is inferior to something I wrote thirty years ago? But I'll be frank with you, I plainly resisted when Pippin asked me to take care of you. Not **because** of you but **for **you. I thought you belonged with Pippin and part of me always has, you're my once best friend's only child and he missed your whole upbringing. I have always loved you like you were my own, but deep down I knew you weren't and that the best thing for **you** would be to be amongst your own family. Then I realised that perhaps we were your family now."

"And don't you go being mad at me for whatever he wrote!" Estella said. "When he asked me if we could take care of you I said yes, I never said I didn't want you. And I have considered myself your mother since you were an infant, whether anybody likes it or not."

"All I've known these past days is that the truth I thought I knew was wrong. My parents didn't want me and neither did you. The people who ought to love me the most all tried to get rid of me!"

"Don't be so hard on Pippin" Merry said. "He wasn't allowed to raise you, he had no choice but to give you up."

"But he never came to see me. Never asked for me. I have not even seen him for seven years! And I've never spent more time in his presence than maybe an hour, he's never spoken directly to me other than when I've displeased him."

"Faramir was there ever anything you missed growing up?" Estella asked him.

"I don't think so."

"Then wherein lies the problem?"

"I don't know… I guess what I wanted to say to you tonight is that I'm sorry. I was wrong. And I love you both. You didn't have to take me in, after all, but you did. I can never repay you everything you've done for me."

"We don't want you to" Merry said. "We just want you to be happy. And I can tell you one thing right now, had it not been for the fact that you are my cousin's heir I would have adopted you decades ago. I think you ought to know that."

"Laddie you just need to make peace with your past" Estella said. "What went on when you were a baby was something that was out of your hands. It wasn't you who made your father decide to stay out of your life, he never even knew you."

"Do you think I should talk to him?" Faramir asked.

"No" Merry said. "I tried for a decade to get through to him and I had no luck. He's as stubborn as you are. You don't know him and he doesn't know you, I don't think there would be any benefits from the two of you talking."

"I know I don't know him… But I always loved him" Faramir said. "Or I loved the picture you painted for me. When I was little I wanted the two of you to be my parents, but as I grew older and heard more about him I wanted to know my real father. I guess I've just begun to realise that it doesn't matter, there's nothing he can give me that I didn't get from you. I'm sorry I lashed out at you."

"Never mind that" Merry said. "I think you need to get into bed, laddie. It's late. Your sisters have been wondering when you'll be home, you need energy tomorrow to deal with their million questions. Go to bed."

Faramir nodded and gave Estella a hug before retreating to his own bedroom. Estella crawled back into bed and went to sleep right away knowing where all the children were. Merry could not go to sleep quite so easily, he laid away thinking about what had gone on these past days. It had been so long since he had tried to bring father and son back together, Faramir had grown up since then. Merry had allowed himself to forget about the drama that would no doubt occur when Faramir came face to face with his heritage. At least so far it seemed to be going well.


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note**: Happy New Year everyone! Hope you had a great Christmas & New Year's! I'm sorry this chapter took so long to get up, especially since it's not very long, but I actually wrote it in only one day. It just took me a while to get working on it since I'm currently focusing on my "Tale of Years" story. Anyhoo, this chapter is short but hopefully it gains in quality what it lacks in quantity. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: You know the drill…

**XXX  
XXX  
XXX**

Faramir felt uneasy walking down the halls of the Great Smials. He could feel, as well as see, heads turning and looking at him with curiosity as he passed through the corridors that would have been his home if things had been different. Everybody at the Great Smials knew who Faramir Took was, they had all met him at one point or another, but he had never come to the Smials without Merry Brandybuck accompanying him. This time Merry was not with him, and the Hobbits grew curious as to why that was.

He reached the door to the Thain's study and for a brief second wondered if he was supposed to report to someone before coming to see the busy Thain. But then he shrugged that thought, after all he was the Thain's son and should be allowed a surprise visit. Not to mention he was worried that he might lose his nerve if he stopped to find a secretary. Now that he had gotten this far he was not about to coward out.

He knocked and was told to enter. Pippin looked up from his paperwork and his eyes did not betray whatever he was feeling. Faramir figured he had to be surprised, curious or at the very least having some sense of recognition, but there was nothing. For a moment Faramir felt like a complete stranger, someone he had never even met before. This was not going to be easy.

"Yes?" Pippin said.

"Do you have a minute?" Faramir said. "I have to speak with you."

"Indeed?" Pippin glanced at the clock on the wall. "I'll give you ten minutes. Sit."

Faramir obediently sat down on the chair standing on the opposite side of the desk. He took a deep breath and hoped he would be able to pull this off. He had a feeling it would be anything but easy, especially since he had no bond or relationship whatsoever with this Hobbit. He had thought of the situation from every possible angle but in the end he had been unable to reach any other conclusion than that he would have to speak with Pippin directly.

"I'm sorry to bother you" he opened with. "Though I have a matter which you need to attend to. And it's rather urgent, at least as far as I'm concerned."

Pippin looked at the Hobbit sitting opposite him, the one who had been born 33 years ago. The only reason Pippin knew Faramir's exact age was that he still remembered his wife's death very vividly and always knew exactly how much time had passed since that happened. The years had eased his sorrow but he had never been able to fully move on. He wondered what this Hobbit could need from him now, after all these years.

"I have come of age and I am on my way to begin my life for real" Faramir said and wondered why he couldn't look his father in the eye when he spoke with him. But his father was a stranger to him. "Part of that is getting married… There is a lass I've been courting for the past two years now and I want to ask for her hand in marriage. I've spoken with my… with Merry about it, and he thinks it's a good idea. But even though he has been responsible for me during my childhood I still need your consent before I can ask her, since the lass in question would be the future Madam of the Smials. So I'm here to ask for your consent."

For a second Pippin thought he must be joking. The child could not be old enough to be married yet. 33 years, sure, but Pippin could not believe that marriage would be on his mind. Not that he cared much about it, this was all Merry's business not his, though he knew that Faramir was right and that he would have to give his consent. It was more a formality than anything else though, it was really up to Merry to make that call, at least in Pippin's opinion, so with a slight smile he realised the visit might only last for three minutes instead of a full ten.

"Alright then" Pippin said. "Who is the lass in question?"

Faramir swallowed nervously.

"Goldilocks Gamgee."

"Goldilocks Gamgee?" Pippin echoed. "Sam Gamgee's daughter?" He couldn't help but add: "What for?"

"What for? I'm in love with her! We've been courting for two years! I spent a lot of time with the Gamgee's a couple of years back and Goldilocks and I, we connected. I'm happy when I'm with her. And I want to be with her forever."

Pippin rose from his chair and began to slowly walk around the room while mulling this over. Faramir watched him nervously. He had no idea what the outcome would be of this, even Merry had been doubtful, and in this case Faramir didn't have any emotional attachments to help him get the answer he wanted. The Thain would be thinking rationally, and rationally Faramir knew there was little chance of him getting permission to marry Goldilocks. But he didn't care about any of that. And he needed to make Pippin understand what this would mean to him.

"She's a great lass" he said. "Though you know that already, you know all of Sam's children. I know it might seem a bit odd for me to want to be with her, but after two years I am sure. Merry thought it was a good idea, and since he has to consider the same things you do I expect there shall be no problem."

"She's hardly from the right class" Pippin said and twirled his pocket watch between his fingers. "She's Sam's daughter of course, but still…"

There was a pause. Faramir eyed Pippin with a frown. He was not a patient Hobbit and he wanted his answer not a lecture on Hobbit class. He knew all that already, he had been worried for a long time now that it would come to affect this moment of his life. Now he wanted to know.

"What do you think?" he asked.

"I think Merry was out of his mind allowing this from the get go" Pippin said.

"I'm grown up" Faramir said. "I don't need parental permission to fall in love."

"What do you know about love?" Pippin scoffed.

"What do you?" Faramir replied but realised it was a mistake.

"Plenty more than you ever will" Pippin said in a tone that was as cold as ice.

"You can't prove it by me" Faramir said, continuing on even though he knew that he shouldn't. But he had been quiet for long enough. "In 33 years you have never showed me any love. The only person I think you've ever loved is yourself."

"I have loved more than you will ever be capable of. So many people, so many places."

"And yet you are not capable of giving anything to the one you ought to have loved the most. I came here today to get your consent for securing a happy future for myself, yet you cannot even give me that even though it's a simple word away."

"There's more to love than happiness."

Faramir glared at the stranger sitting opposite him. He knew what he was referring to, and he couldn't believe he would be using that argument. Well Faramir could return the favour, he had a thing or to himself to say on that subject.

"Sometimes I wonder about my mother, the one you claim to have loved so much. I know she must be furious with you, wherever she is now, for not caring for her child. And when you die she will not be waiting for you. You have not deserved her. When you let me down you let her down."

Pippin's eyes narrowed.

"Don't you ever speak of her with me again" he said. "You don't know half the things I know. Don't you dare pass out judgement over me."

"All I want out of you is an answer. Just give me a simple yes and you will never have to see me again" Faramir said. "It's the one and only thing you have to do, so do it and we will be forever rid of one another."

"Your time is up" Pippin said with a glare at the younger Hobbit. "I have more important things to do. You know the way out, I take it."

"You haven't given me an answer yet" Faramir said while he rose.

"You can come back in two days" Pippin said and opened the door for him. "And you can tell Merry I'm disappointed with him. And that he is crazy."

Angrily Faramir strode out the door. He should have known it would not go his way. If only he hadn't opened his big mouth, what good did he think it would do to question this Hobbit? He already knew how stubborn the Thain was and that insulting his ego was a sure way of getting your request rejected. He wished that he only needed Merry's approval. He couldn't see why his birth father should have a say in the matter, Merry was the one who could tell whether or not he and Goldilocks would be right for one another and if it would be a good match. Merry was the one with Faramir's best interest at heart. All the Thain would know was whether or not she would make a good future Madam, but to Faramir that was the least relevant part. How he wished he was just an ordinary Hobbit and didn't have to become the Thain one day. His life would have been so much easier.

**XX  
XX**

"I should have known it was no use" Faramir complained to Dawn the next day, stretched out on a meadow near Brandy Hall. "It doesn't matter to him that Goldilocks is the daughter of a friend of his, he won't give me his consent. Ironic, isn't it? For 33 years he wants nothing to do with me, but my love interest is deemed not good enough for me."

"Faramir you don't know that he will turn you down" Dawn said.

"Of course he's going to turn me down. He just wants me to pine a bit because I insulted him. I know I should have held my tongue, but honestly he deserved to hear what I had to say. He can refuse to speak with me but he cannot refuse to listen. I've been silent for far too long. And now he is paying me back. He could have told me no then and there, but instead he keeps me waiting for two days. He probably wants me to think that he will say yes, only so he can crush me tomorrow."

"Isn't that a little unfair?" Dawn had to ask. "You don't know that for sure."

"Dawn, think about it. When has he ever done anything for me? When has he made sure I was doing okay, asked about me, or visited me when I was sick? I am nothing but a name in a family tree to him, far more distant than those friends he has that sailed west long before I was even born. I'm not **real** to him. My only task in life is, in his eyes, to carry on the family tree. And that should be with someone of my own social standing. But if he knew the slightest bit about my life he would care more about what I **feel** for her than what her last name happens to be."

"I agree that that is more important" Dawn said. "But we are of a different generation."

"Merry is of the same generation as the Thain, in fact he is from an even older one! Yet he did not see any problems with it."

"That is not entirely true" Dawn reminded him. "Dad was very sceptical at first. But he cares about you so he gave you his consent. Did you ever stop to think that perhaps he could give you his consent because it's not really his decision to make? It is not up to him to decide whether or not she is a good enough match, only the Thain can decide that for the future Thain, so whatever Dad said would not have mattered in the end. So he chose to be supportive. But had you been his son I think there's a great chance he would have told you no."

"Thank you Dawn, that is very supportive" Faramir snarled.

"I'm just being realistic. Don't judge him based on Dad's decision for their situations are different. Though I do agree that he could have told you yesterday instead of keeping you waiting like this. Dad would not have kept you waiting."

"I cannot believe those two were actually friends once" Faramir said with a sigh and covered his eyes with his hands to block out the sun.

"I don't remember that too well, I was still so little when they turned their relationship into strictly business."

"I'm talking about before we were even born. They owned Crickhollow together, they were often in each other's company. People say they were so often seen together that when one appeared without the other people started to worry about the other one."

"Things change."

"But it's odd, isn't it? They were so close and now they have hardly no contact at all. Can you imagine what it would be like if ten years from today you and I barely spoke? I don't have any friends that I am as close with as those two were claimed to be but I find it odd enough to imagine not seeing any of my friends regularly."

"Things change" Dawn said again.

"I cannot for the life of me understand why Merry was so close with him" Faramir said and sat up, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand. "The two are as different as night and day. Who would put up with someone like the Thain? Someone so lacking of heart and empathy… Not a joyful bone in him."

"Maybe he was not always like that" Dawn suggested.

"Perhaps… But not likely. When I was growing up Merry told me amazing stories about my father, wanting me to be proud of him and of my heritage. But it was all make believe. The Hobbit he told me about was warm, compassionate and always with a fun and carefree spirit. That sounds nothing like the grumpy, bitter Hobbit who has my whole future in his hands and doesn't care."

"I'm sorry Faramir…" Dawn said. She didn't know what else to say.

"I'm sorry too" Faramir said. "The day after tomorrow I have to ride to Hobbiton and tell Goldilocks we can't be courting anymore. It's a waste of her time and mine to be together when it won't lead anywhere. And a few years down the line I'll settle for some boring Chubb or Bracegirdle and make Peregrin the Grumpy happy. If he knows the meaning of that word."

"Stop it" Dawn said. "You're sounding as bitter as you paint him out to be."

Faramir bit his lip. The last thing he wanted was to be compared with his father. Deep down he was scared that he would end up being the same way. He could not deny that the Thain's blood was in his veins and that he would inevitably take after some of his sides. His whole heritage felt like a curse, there was nothing he could do to get away from it and it kept hanging over him like a dark cloud. It gave him sides to himself that he wished he didn't have, it gave him a future he had never asked for and it always kept him a hint of a step outside the family he had grown up in. No matter what Merry, Estella or any of their children said he knew he was never completely part of them and never would be. And all he got in return was a bitter father who was too busy hanging on to the past to live in the now.

"It's getting chilly" Faramir said and got up on his feet.

"What are you talking about, it's hot out!" Dawn said and turned her face up towards the sun even though her mother had told her to keep her hat on at all times and avoid being sunburned. "I want to stay out in the sun."

"I'm cold, I'm going back to the Hall" Faramir insisted and whistled for his pony. "You can stay if you'd like."

With a sigh Dawn got up. He knew she would not stay behind and let him leave alone, especially not when he was upset. Sometimes he was really not much fun. These past few years he had been constantly preoccupied with his past and without knowing it he was becoming bitter with his father. Dawn knew that her own father was worried about it, the bitterness was one quality which they would all gladly see skip the younger generation. Dawn wished Faramir would talk about these things with his friends instead of with her, but he kept his jolly side for them and his grumpier for his brother and sisters at Brandy Hall.

"Let's go then" Dawn sighed and grabbed her reins. "Faramir try to keep your mind off this until tomorrow. There is nothing more that you can do now. You only need to accept it. Prove that you are not like him, accept and move on."

Faramir didn't reply but somewhere inside he knew that she was right.

**XX  
XX**

"Sit" Pippin commanded.

Faramir obediently sat down and awaited the decision. He felt a lot more calm and relaxed now than he had two days ago. After what Dawn had said he had decided to really prove that he was different from his father and would not let himself be pulled down. He knew what answer he wanted but if he didn't get it he would accept it and move on. He had decided that the only way Pippin could win was if Faramir allowed himself to let this get to him and put his life on hold because of it. And he would not let that happen.

"I have to say I think you are absolutely out of your mind for wanting to marry a Gamgee" Pippin declared and put aside the pencil he had been playing with to lean over the desk and look Faramir in the eye. "I guess that's what an upbringing in Buckland will do to you. But you are not here to discuss that matter."

Faramir had to bite his lip not to say something stupid again. Whose fault was it he had not had an upbringing in Tuckburough, really?

"I don't want to waste your time" he said instead. "I just want to hear your answer and then I will be gone."

"I count upon it" Pippin said. "Did you tell Merry I thought he was crazy?"

"No."

"Too bad. Crazy is the right word for it. But if you absolutely have to find yourself a Gamgee then one of Sam's daughters is the best you can do. If Merry gave you his consent then I have nothing more to add."

"What… are you saying?" Faramir asked.

"You're not my son, I haven't raised you and I do not know you. Make whatever decisions you want, reason with Merry about it and if you want me to consent then I will, unless it's something totally outrageous. Which I must admit I at first thought this was."

"You mean I can marry her?"

"If you must."

A smile crept across Faramir's face.

"Thank you sir" he said and rose to leave.

"Hold it!" Pippin said. "We are not finished yet."

Faramir sat back down and wondered what they could possibly have left to say to one another. It was hardly time for a father-to-son talk about love and marriage, he would get that from Merry anyhow. Pippin had given him the only thing he had to give and Faramir wanted to get back to the Hall as soon as he could to tell everybody the good news. And tomorrow he would ride to Hobbiton but instead of breaking up with Goldilocks he would ask Sam for her hand.

Pippin rose and walked over to a small bureau in the corner of the room. He fished out a key from his pocked and opened a small drawer. Then he paused for a while as if mulling something over. He then picked something up, closed the drawer again and turned to Faramir.

"There is something you need to take with you when you leave" he said. "If you are indeed going through with this."

"I am" Faramir said, growing tired of the constant questioning.

Pippin sat back down and placed a small box on the desk between them.

"I gave that to my wife when I married her" he said. "It's a tradition. The Thain, or future Thain, has given it to his bride since the days of old Isumbras."

Faramir carefully picked the box up and opened it. There was a diamond ring inside, looking like it was worth a fortune.

"Put it on her finger when you marry her. And be **very** careful with it! When your son gets married someday, you give it to him."

Faramir stared at the ring without knowing what to say. He had never expected such a grand gift from his father.

"This is incredible…" he said.

"It's tradition" Pippin said, underlining it in such a way that Faramir knew that it was not a gift of love or care. It was just another thing that had to be done.

"I will give this to her, if she will have me" he said and put the box in his pocked. "And thank you again, sir."

Barely able to contain his excitement he rose, took a bow and then hurried out the door. One more night and then he could ask Sam for Goldilocks' hand. He was closer now than he had ever dared to believe he would be. And all thanks to the Thain suddenly seeming to change his mind. Faramir didn't know if it was because of the things he had said or because he had underestimated him, but in the end he didn't care. It was the end result that mattered to him, and he had no complaints now. For the first time his future laid ahead of him, shining bright and promising.

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I don't know when I'll have the next part up. Could be this time tomorrow or it could be this time next month. But I'm aiming to have it up as soon as possible. The next chapter is the last one.

Thank you for reading! If you had fun reading, please reward me with a review!


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note**: Wow, this is the final chapter of this series! This feels so special to me, the first series I have wrapped up! And I'm very thankful to all of you who have been with me up until this last instalment. I hope you will think I wrote a good ending. There's not much that needs to be said to set this one up. You will get the hang of it on your own. Uh, I hope. Lol.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own the characters used in this fanfiction.

**XXX  
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Pippin ran a hand through his curls which were beginning to turn grey. He sighed deeply. He could not believe that he was 75 years old. At one point in his life he thought he would never make it past 28, at another he thought he would never want to make it past 40. But here he was, 75 years old and still healthy and active. No doubt he would live to see 85.

Opposite him sat Merry, who was only two years away from his 85th birthday and just as healthy as Pippin was. Neither of them had really begun to feel the effects of aging much, except for a few strains of grey in Merry's curls. Both felt just as young and strong as they had twenty years ago.

Though on days like this one, when they had spent hours on end going over business details, they both felt closer to 111 than 75. Finally they were done and Merry had begun packing up his things. Pippin decided he would go fetch his favourite pony and go for a long ride once Merry had left. Spending some time out in the open was exactly what he needed right now.

"I will see you next month then" Merry said and put the last of his papers in his bag. "Unless something else comes up."

"I pray that it won't" Pippin said and rubbed his temples. "These meetings will kill me, mark my words!"

"They do say that the pen is sharper than the sword" Merry joked.

"Whoever said that must have had an office" Pippin decided. "See you in a month. Bring me shorter reports next time."

"I will do my best" Merry said and rose. "Oh, and Pippin… I don't know if this interests you or not, but you should know that you have a new heir."

"I what?"

"Your son had a son two days ago. Congratulations."

Pippin raised his eyebrows and was just about to comment when Merry left the room. Pippin had to admit that he was surprised. He hadn't even known Goldilocks was expecting. He wondered how she was doing now, but since Merry hadn't said anything he took it she was doing fine. Then he rose from his seat with a shrug to the shoulders and went to get his pony. This new piece of information did not change his life, it might just as well have been someone else's baby born. Right now all he wanted was to go out riding.

**XX  
XX**

Three days later Pippin found himself tying up his pony outside Crickhollow, where he had heard Faramir and Goldilocks were living. He didn't know why but his curiosity had drawn him there. He had thought long and hard before making the decision to come, but once his mind was made up he had gone straight to Crickhollow. No use wasting useful time, he would come there and see the child and then return to the Smials.

A very strange feeling came over him as he walked up the gravel path towards the round door. He had not set foot here in three decades, but it had been his home once. A long time ago. It felt like a lifetime. The exterior of the house had not changed much over the years, if he squinted Pippin could still picture himself raking the gravel path, talking to Diamond who would be doing her knitting by the opened window nearby. And somewhere in this picture was Merry, probably in the stables grooming the ponies. Those had been different times, happier times. The happiest of his life.

He knocked on the door and wondered if anybody would be able to hear it. He and Merry had never been able to hear the door knock, they had tied a bell to a string so that people could yank it and they would hear the bell ringing. The string was now gone, presumably the bell was too. But Pippin could hear footsteps on the other side of the door, someone had heard him.

Faramir opened the door and looked surprised to see him. But the surprise soon turned into a formal exterior.

"What can I do for you?" he asked.

Pippin felt oddly nervous. Faramir was standing in the doorway, and with Pippin on the ground that made the younger Hobbit just a bit taller than the older one. Pippin was not used to people looking down at him, the only one taller than him was Merry. He stepped up the three steps and came in a height he was used to.

"Merry told me that a baby had been born. Congratulations are in order."

"Thank you" Faramir said, in the same tone he would have used to a stranger.

"It seemed like I should come and see the child, it is customary when a heir has been born" Pippin said, not knowing why he felt so unsure.

"Heir?" Faramir echoed.

"When you take over office this boy will be the heir."

"It's not a boy" Faramir said and leaned against the doorpost with his arms crossed. "It's a girl actually."

"A girl? Merry said it was a boy!"

"It's not" Faramir said.

"I'm sorry" Pippin said. "A boy would have been preferable, your wife wouldn't have to risk another pregnancy if you had gotten an heir."

"A girl is fine with us" Faramir said. "Goldilocks is as strong as a horse and if she is anything like her mother she will have no trouble having a boy further down the line. You came here to see your heir, I'm sorry that all you got was a baby girl, but perhaps it's not a total waste. After all you are not required to come see the baby now that it's not your heir, so you won't have to waste your precious time. You can return to your other duties and not worry about feeling guilty. I'm sorry that you wasted your time. Although one might wonder why you found it necessary to come see your new heir after only five days when it took you four years to come see your first one."

The tone in Faramir's voice made Pippin feel like he should retreat. But he was not about to be chased away by this lad, he had come to see his grandchild and he was not planning on leaving before he had gotten to do so.

"Your snide remarks aside," he said to Faramir, "I am not here for your sake but for the baby's and if you want to be a good father you need to learn to put your feelings and needs second."

"Am I getting a lesson in parenting from you?"

"I think the baby should be visited by her grandfather" Pippin said firmly.

"Her grandfather already has come to see her" Faramir said. "Both her grandfathers. They came the very day she was born. You are a bit late. Either way she is sleeping and I won't disturb her. Come back some other time, she will still be here then."

That reply made Pippin back down. He gave Faramir a look which did not betray the hurt nor the anger he was feeling and then walked down the steps again.

"Do have a good life" he said as he walked back to his pony.

**XX  
XX**

Merry took his eyes off the baby in his arms and looked up at Faramir when he entered the room. He could tell that something had happened.

"Who was it?" he asked.

"Nobody important" Faramir said. "A misguided well-wisher."

"Do not hog the baby Merry, let me hold her now!" Sam insisted and lifted his granddaughter from Merry's arms into his own.

"She's beautiful, Faramir!" Merry said and cooed the baby. "But I've told you that already. Have you got a name for her yet?"

"No not yet" Faramir said. "For now she's just Baby."

He sat down with a heavy sigh and looked out the window. He could spot Pippin trotting off on his pony, disappearing behind a hilltop. He didn't know why but it made him feel sad.

"Faramir what is the matter?" Merry asked with a concerned frown.

"Nothing's the matter" Faramir said and turned his eyes back to the baby. He smiled slightly. "I was just wondering for how long Goldilocks planned on taking her nap. It would be a shame if she missed seeing you Sam while you're here."

"I'm not going anywhere for a few hours yet" Sam said and gently bounced the baby. "There's nothing quite like the smell of a newborn baby…"

Merry nodded in agreement and grabbed the baby by the foot. He grinned at her spit bubbles and was reminded of when Faramir was a newborn baby. Now he was all grown up, and by the looks of it not having the best day of his life, in spite of the new baby. Merry knew him well enough to know that even though he said everything was fine it was not.

"You have the same wrinkle in your forehead that Pippin gets when he tries to pretend he is doing great" he remarked.

Faramir snorted. Being reminded of Pippin was the last thing he wanted right now.

"I'm just tired, that's all. Baby does not exactly sleep for many hours in a row."

"You didn't at this age either" Merry said with a laugh. "Out of all the children I have cradled in my arms, you were by far the one with the shortest sleep span. Never more than an hour at a time."

"It's a miracle you kept me" Faramir remarked.

"Oh, you were such a delight" Merry said and cooed the baby. "Even though you sounded like five babies instead of one when you started to scream."

"I think that's enough stories of my childhood" Faramir decided and chuckled. "If you have to talk about it, please talk about the easier parts."

"There aren't any" Sam said with a grin. "Because then they grow up and make a career out of getting into mischief."

"Oh you wouldn't be a mischievous one, would you?" Merry said to the baby.

Faramir watched the two compete over who could pamper the baby more and felt a lot better than he had a few minutes ago. His daughter would have all the things that made his own childhood rich, and she would have it with her biological parents. And she would always have her grandparents and her many aunts and uncles there for her if she needed them.

**XX  
XX**

"Peregrin!"

The voice stopped Pippin, who had been on his way out towards his favourite spot on the meadow by the Great Smials. He turned to see who had called out to him and saw Faramir approaching him. The younger Hobbit looked composed but Pippin could tell he was upset over something. Pippin could not figure out what, but whatever it was he hoped it wouldn't take long. If Faramir had something to say to him he could come during visiting hours, right now Pippin had some spare time and he wanted to spend it by his favourite spot.

"A minute of your precious time?"

"Make it quick" Pippin said. "I was on my way somewhere."

"Somewhere more important than wherever I may be" Faramir concluded. "That is always the case, isn't it?"

"If you have something to say, say it."

"I just wanted to say to you that you have been wrong. All my life you have been wrong. Every child deserves to be loved by their parents, and looking at my daughter I cannot believe you and I are even related. For when I look at her I feel my life has finally found a meaning. When you look at me you feel that yours lost its meaning. I know what blame you place upon my shoulders and you are wrong. It was not I who killed my mother, **nobody** killed my mother, she died at childbirth and it happens. When it does the father has the responsibility to love the child enough for both parents. And you didn't. In the end I just feel ashamed that I descend from you. I came here to tell you that you have been wrong, and also that you will not be seeing my daughter. When a son comes along you can officially declare him your heir if that is what the Thain must do, but there ends your contact with any children I might have in the future. You don't deserve to be in their lives. You had the obligation to be a part of mine, when you denied that you gave up the privilege of being a part of your grandchildren's. You never gave anything to me and I don't want you to give anything to them. The only paternal grandfather they will ever know is the one who truly deserves the title and who will make the most out of it. So don't come over anymore, stay away. You've done a pretty good job so far, I would hate to see that change."

"You say I did nothing for you?" Pippin asked. "Did you have a horrible childhood? I made good arrangements for you."

"Arrangements" Faramir scoffed. "They were not for me, they were for you. Stow the child away and pretend he never existed. Luckily for you you will never have to change that."

"Either you had a bad childhood or you didn't, if you did you ought to take that up with the people who raised you and if you didn't I can't see why you are giving me a tell-off to begin with."

"You failed me" Faramir said. "I just wanted you to know that."

Pippin watched him walk away and then continued his own walk down to the end of the meadow. There was a large oak tree there, it had stood for as long as anybody could remember. By the foot of the tree, protected by the shadows cast by the leaves, was a grave marked by a small stone platter. All other traces that someone laid buried here were since long gone. Pippin kneeled and efficiently got rid of the weed growing amongst the orchids that grew over the grave. They had been planted there once, but now they grew wild all around the tree.

"No weeds can there be among the flowers that guard my wife" Pippin said out loud as he finished weeding the part above where Diamond lay buried.

He rose to his feet and bowed his head as he always did when he came to visit her. He visited her every Tuesday, the day of the week she had been buried. Sometimes he came there more often, comforted by being as near her as he could get, but the only thing that kept him away on Tuesdays was if he was very ill our out on travels.

In his mind he began a conversation with Diamond, as he always did. When he came to visit her he updated her on what was happening around him, what he was thinking and feeling and what was going on with Faramir. She could never answer him, but just talking to her in his mind made him feel a whole lot better.

Once he was finished he remained standing there with his head bowed, reluctant to leave her. In many ways she was all that he had left, even though she had been gone for 35 years. It never occurred to him that that would be sad, he felt comforted by being near her grave and from the knowledge that the bond that had formed between them during their short time together could not be broken, even by death.

After a while, he did not know how long, he could hear footsteps approaching. He did not turn around to see who it was, he could still recognise those steps anywhere and he knew that he was meant to, otherwise the approaching Hobbit would not have walked loudly enough to be heard.

Merry came up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"I can't stand by and watch anymore as you turn your back on everything that you were" he said. "I once said I would always come for you."

"Nobody is expecting you to come" Pippin said calmly. "And I'm not turning my back on anything. I'm just coping. Understand Merry that things changed irreversibly 35 years ago and nothing anybody can say or do is ever going to make that undone. You haven't helped me because you can't help me. There's no need to feel bad or like you went back on a promise."

Merry didn't say anything but he kept his hand on Pippin's shoulder. After a few minutes Pippin bit his lip and tilted his head back up.

"Why did you tell me the baby was a boy?"

"I was afraid you wouldn't come if it was a girl. How did you find out that it wasn't a boy?"

"I came" Pippin said. "I was not welcome."

"Oh Pippin…"

Pippin shrugged his shoulders. He was not surprised. Merry didn't know what to say, he felt bad for his cousin but he couldn't pretend that he didn't understand Faramir.

"You cannot blame him though" he said. "It's hard for him. And it probably stung that you didn't come to see him until you were forced to when he was four years old, yet you came to see your grandson so soon after his birth."

"You think I'm a terrible father, don't you?" Pippin said, stating facts more than anything else.

Merry was taken aback by the comment. The truth was he didn't think Pippin was a real father at all, but he couldn't very well say that.

"Pippin I don't know how to respond to that."

"I know you think that I didn't care. And that I never lifted a finger for his sake. But you're wrong. He is wrong. All of you are."

"How are we wrong?" Merry asked and squeezed Pippin's shoulder. "Dear foolish Pip, you everything but publicly disowned him!"

"You know I do not love him, I will not pretend that I ever have" Pippin said. "But never let it be said that I didn't give him anything. I gave him everything. All that I had left. I gave him the one thing that mattered the most to me, now that Diamond was gone. I gave him you."

"Me?"

"Yes. I gave you up Merry, for his sake. My best friend, the other half of me, the mirror image of my own soul. I needed you desperately but I knew he would need you more."

"I'm sorry, this makes no sense" Merry said. "Gave me up? How did you do that? Were we not friends when Faramir was little? There was no stopping us from being as close as always save for you and your stubbornness."

"Merry I couldn't love him, I just couldn't. Not because I blamed him for what happened to Diamond, but because of the effect losing her had on me. You don't know, you can't know how it was. She was everything to me, my whole world, she was the gold that awaited me at the end of the rainbow. When I was with her all the pain and suffering I carried with me from the war just became light as clouds and vanished. I loved her so much, and losing her was without a doubt the worst thing that ever happened to me."

"You don't have to tell me how much you cared for her" Merry said. "I was there. I know. All the good parts and all the bad parts."

"When she died I was left with an infant that I knew I wouldn't be allowed, or able, to care for. And loving him was never an option. I would not have been able to love him as much as a father would, and then have him taken away from me. Because he would be taken away. I would lose him, and that would hurt far too bad for me to be able to deal with it. I could not afford to love him knowing that all I would ever get was a visit a few days each week. I would be cheated of his whole childhood, never there to read him stories or wake him up in the morning or soothe him when he hurt himself. All I would have would be a few hours here or there. I would be likely to miss his first step, his first word, his first smile. And he would be growing up in another family, not knowing who to cling to, the one who fathered him or the one raising him. I know you think I made the wrong decision but it was the only decision I could make, had I loved him I would not have made it through."

"As much as it would have hurt you to say goodbye when you left him, the moments you would have had with him would more than make up for it. Those moments would have helped you get through. You would have seen that he was worth every sacrifice you made."

"I have never resented him for the sacrifice I did make" Pippin said. "Was he worth giving you up? I don't know. But it was all I had to give him. Merry I couldn't have just a few moments here or there, it would have ruined me. Saying goodbye to Diamond was hard enough, having to parent her son from a distance would be even harder."

"But Pippin you never gave me up" Merry said. "Not for Faramir, not for anyone. We ended our friendship years later, for other reasons."

"No" Pippin said. "I knew from the start that it could not work that way. That is why it took me a whole week to make my decision. It was the hardest choice of my life but I knew in my heart that it was the only choice I could make."

"I don't understand."

"Like I said, I couldn't love him and I knew that much. He had to be given away and you were the only one I trusted enough to look after him. But I knew that if I gave him to you things would have to change forever between us. It would not be long before you would have to be forced to choose sides, you would not be able to love me like I was used to and love him the way he needed to be loved at the same time. With me not loving him and wanting nothing to do with him you would end up in situations where you would be unable to combine your loyalties. Your loyalty would have to be put to the test time and time again and I knew without a shred of doubt that you would have to choose the child in the end, every time. A horrible position to put you in, and I'm sorry for it. For many years I tried to go on like things were the same, selfishly holding on to you for as long as I could. But then there came a day when I knew that it was just not working. So I cut you loose, I gave you the perfect opportunity to step away from me and focus only on him, and you took it. Just like I knew you would."

"You mean that whole argument was a set up?"

"Who in their right mind blames a child for the mother dying at childbirth?" Pippin said. "True I did for a few months shortly after it happened but once I came to my senses I knew that it was not the child's fault. But I hooked the bate and you swallowed it. You were all I had left in the world and I pushed you away so that you could take care of my child. I gave him to you with the knowledge of how it would have to be, because I couldn't think of anyone better to raise him. It was the best possible thing I could do for the boy. You and you alone would be able to love him like I would have if things were different. I had depended on your love every moment of my life up until that moment, and I gave it all to him. I knew of nothing better to give to him, the most precious gift I still had in life. I knew you would love him for us both, love him like you and I loved each other."

"I said something similar to him once, when I gave him his name" Merry mused. "I promised to love him as much as you and I loved one another."

"And you made good on that promise."

"Oh Pippin…" Merry said. "Why did you have to go do all of this? Why?"

"If you don't understand it yet then we have grown further apart than I thought. I gave my son the grandest thing I knew to give, I gave him you, my rock, for him to hold on to from now on. And you've never failed me."

"All those stubborn refusals to see him… All those ludicrous accusations towards him…"

"I was afraid of falling in love with him when I saw him. Luckily I didn't, enough time had passed. And those accusations were all tests of your loyalty, until I finally broke loose. You are the only one to know the truth Meriadoc, and I don't want you to tell anybody else about it. You obviously can't understand it, so I don't care about telling anybody else. Especially Faramir."

It was the second time Merry had ever heard Pippin say his name

"I think he would want to know" Merry said softly. "I think he deserves to know."

"No" Pippin said. "Let him hate me. Let him love you. Let his life be the way that it is, he would never understand anyhow and it would do him no good to know. He would only be confused all over again and he doesn't need that. I was never fit to be a parent anyhow. And I don't want to try and bond with him now, after all these years."

"Can you really be happy knowing that there is no bond between you and your only son?" Merry asked.

"Your son, Merry" Pippin said. "Didn't I tell you I gave him to you for as long as my life would last? As far as I'm concerned I never had a son…"

"Fool of a Took" Merry said. "I never thought it would come to this. Not in a million years. Do you know how many times I wished I wasn't raising your son? It never made sense for him to be with me when he belonged with you."

"I'm sorry to hear that" Pippin said. "Perhaps I made a mistake thinking you would be able to love him enough."

"It was never a question of love, I love him like he was my own. He feels like he's my own. But he's not. And for all the things you believe you gave him you took away the only father he's ever had and left him alone to feel unwanted and unloved. Curse you for that, Pippin."

"Then there's nothing more to say" Pippin said. "After all this time we have finally come to the end of the line. You know my truth now, do with it as you wish. Goodbye, cousin Merry. You were a good friend."

Merry had since long pulled back his hand and wished he could will Pippin into turning around and facing him. He hated having this conversation with Pippin's neck. But perhaps that was only fitting. Pippin turned his back on everything these days. It was the only thing he knew how to do. Upset Merry turned and began to leave, but he only got a few steps before he had to stop and turn to face Pippin one last time.

"Do you know what I hate the most?" he asked. "It's not that I still love you after all of this. It's that Faramir does. And he hates himself for it. He hates himself every time he rejects you, every time he recognises part of you in himself and every time he is reminded that he was not good enough for his own father to love. But he loves you and he always has, part of him still wishes today that you would take him in his arms and hold him like you never did when he was a child. That is what I hate the most. That is what's hardest to come to terms with. His heart is aching and it always has been. Because of you."

Pippin finally turned around and looked at his cousin. Merry could see that he had tears in his eyes. A little too late, Merry thought.

"You love me still?"

"Pippin have you heard a word I just said?"

"Just go" Pippin said. "Go and never return. Send someone else to do business, let us cut off all our bonds right here and now. For everyone's sake."

"There is a bond here that will never break" Merry said and began walking back to Pippin. "Frankly I won't let you do this to yourself. You may never have loved Faramir, I don't know whether or not that is true, but I know that you stopped loving yourself when Diamond died. You blame yourself for her death and you have been punishing yourself ever since. Stop it. You have made amends by now. Let somebody love you Pippin, please! Before it's too late."

"It was too late many years ago."

Merry pulled Pippin close for a hug, the first hug they had shared in two decades.

"Little cousin… I will always come for you when you're sinking, don't you know that I will? It might be too late with Faramir, but let **me** love you. Faramir is grown up now, the old rules you set up no longer apply. I want my best friend back."

"No" Pippin whispered through tears and broke the hug. He gave Merry a pat on the shoulder and forced a smile. "Go back to him. He needs you now more than ever, someone has to teach him how to be a great parent. Go and let this be my last gift to the both of you. And when you look at him, think of the things we shared once."

**XX  
XX**

From a nearby hilltop Faramir stood and watched his birth father being hugged by his surrogate father. He could not make out what they were saying but he could see a glimpse of the friendship that had once been between them. When he saw his real father walk away he turned and left to meet up with him. Together he and Merry would leave the Great Smials, not to return until Peregrin had joined Diamond under the big oak.

**XX  
XX**

For now Pippin was alone under the tree, Diamond too far away for him to reach. He fell down on his knees and gently caressed the platter that stated her year of birth and the year her short life had ended.

"I did the best I could…" he whispered to her. "I did the best I could for our son."

**XXX  
XXX  
XXX**

Thank you for reading! It's been a pleasure having you with me. If you got this far I "rewarded" you by finally letting Pippin speak his mind. Whether or not he did the right thing, or reasoned in the right way, is open for discussion, his explanation is not meant to be either the grand truth or the big wrong. I leave it up to the reader to decide if Pippin was wrong or right, or perhaps a little of both.

Anyways, I hope you will be with me when I start posting my new series, although it might be a while. This time around I'm planning on finish writing it first, and then start posting it. We'll see whether or not I'll be able to keep that goal, since I'm barely half done yet… What I can tell you about that series is that it will be another angst-ish one, so if you thought I did a good job here then hopefully you will like that one to. Above all though, if you thought I **didn't** do a good job, or have any other opinions on how I can improve my writing and my storytelling then please let me know! I would greatly value any constructive criticism you might have!

Thank you for being with me!


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